A Most Unlikely Collection
by NeonZangetsu
Summary: An collection of fragments gathered together; adventures and accidents that might be, could be, or have yet to be. Servants that have yet to be born or will be born, destined for great things. Shards lost somewhere in the abyss between the Throne, the Moon, or the Grail. Yet they were Unlikely indeed, if only for their infamy. These are their stories. Narutoxharem? Vote via review!
1. A Most Unlikely Encounter

**A/N: Welcome one and all!**

**As ever, GhostXavier is my lord and liege and my inspiration for all of this.**

**The moment I laid eyes on Fragments of Chaldea I was spellbound and inspired!**

**Here we have ideas that never quite made it off the cutting floor, as well as situations that shouldn't feasibly occur, and events that shouldn't take place, but do.**

**(EDIT!) It will also contain occasional story ideas as well, for your view pleasure.**

**Can I just say how amazed I am that this series became a thing? Berserker was the first, but from there it took off as you all began demanding more and more Servants, their motivations, and the like. Now, we have only two-technically a third if you count a Master of Black?-remaining, and they'll all be meeting down the road, but this...consider this a present for everyone who sticks with me through the good times and the bad.**

**A Most Unlikely Collection!**

**The scene you see before you was originally meant to be in A Most Unlikely Foreigner but got cut due to the fact that it wouldn't make sense to have him as a Servant at the time. So consider this to be whatever you will; an alternate universe, a fragment in time, or simply a chance meeting between two inhumanely powerful beings.**

**As ever, we're sticking with the "Most Unlikely" theme for titles.**

**Here we have Foreigner!Naruto vs Beast!Naruto...**

**...and what a fight it is.**

**WARNING!**

**Other chapters will be bright.**

**But this one...this one ****gets all kinds of dark.**

**References are references and I don't own jack!**

_"Hold on...now I see a light."_

_"Walk towards it!"_

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Encounter**

The message is relayed.

Across all realms, through worlds dying and dead.

The beast hunts any wearing its face. Some choose to hunt the beast instead.

One pair prove more successful than most. It is a threat to everything they stand for and so when the Grail offers them a deal, the take. Seek it out for themselves. In world after world. Sometimes they arrive too late to do anything more than pick up the ashes; sometimes they find a resistance; those who through some manner or means managed to repel the creature that calls itself beast. Some fall to it. Few know the truth. This is no true Beast but a pretender; something with the potential to become much worse.

And eventually they find it.

Or perhaps the beast finds them. Who can say?

On a world bleak and barren at the end of time, the sky scorched red and the earth cracked with fire, they finally cornered the man who became a monster. All around him the realm wept, no longer having the strength to resist the corroded presence that had ravage its decaying bones. All hope of victory had been beaten from it, blackening the earth underfoot. Like mud. It sucked at Naruto's boots with every step, trying to creep up his legs and drag him under the mire. He resisted it through sheer force of will, and in time, realizing it had bitten off more than it could chew without its master.

There were...things in the mud. Horrible, shapeless things, waiting for the right moment to drag them down.

"This is a bad place." Kaguya whispered as she clung to his shoulders tightly, pale eyes regarding the charred fields, muddy mire, and twisted trees in mournful silence. "I don't like it here."

"Don't worry." Foreigner's hand rose to pat her little head. "We won't linger long."

...I hope you're right."

A flock of withered crows scattered as they climbed the hill, forcing a flinch from the girl.

"He's watching us." she murmured.

Blue eyes regarded the looming crimson clouds. "I know."

Ascending a winding path that might have once been flanked by a picket fence, they reached their destination soon enough, and their target beyond. Indeed, they found the Beast easily enough. He didn't even try to hide, nor did he make any attempt to escape. This was his world now. The creatures here served him. What need had he to flee? Perched on the ruined remains of what might've been a small cottage, he loomed large over the landscape, the lord of his domain, of all he surveyed.

He was far too busy with his meal to greet them; too busy devouring the last dregs of a Servant to notice their presence.

Even from this distance, Foreigner recognized that distinctive grab.

"Is that...?"

The words clenched in his throat.

Kaguya saw who it was and retched. Naruto willed himself forward, hands balling into fists at his side. Until then, they hadn't want to admit it; they'd wanted to believe there was still some hope for this iteration of himself, that he could be redeemed, could be saved, brought back from the brink. Part of him still did. That part had just been dealt a grievous wound.

Seeing is believing, as some say.

He expected blind fury, a slavering, drooling monster. Instead he received something else entirely.

"Oh, good." that monstrous-yet-still-somewhat humanoid head rose at their approach, teeth still stained with the remains of its last meal. Whiskered cheeks-no, wrong, the marks were thicker than they should be-dimpled in a small smile. "One of you actually came looking for me." swaying, he clamored upright on the thatch roof. "Well, hello there! Welcome to my world! I wasn't expecting guests. Just let me finish up here and I'll be _riiight_ with you. Don't go anywhere. kids~!"

Kaguya raised a hand to strike and Naruto swatted it down with a glower.

"Not yet." He hissed. "Wait until he's vulnerable."

She squirmed furiously. "But he killed...!"

_"I know!"_

"Its almost sad, really." The Beast sighed as he climbed down off the roof, one arm clutching what might've been a sword, once upon a time. "She barely put up a fight once I killed him and the kids, you know. Some king she was...though I suppose she wasn't at her best now, was she? No, she hadn't been for quite some time. Lucky me. I've fought that one at her peak before. She hits like a truck, let me tell you! But this thing...it was so very...rusty." those jaws closed down again and the sword broke like glass in his teeth and he glimpsed the ruins of what might have been her soul before his vision went red.

Rage coiled in Foreigner's gut, but Kaguya flung out an arm to stop him.

"What have you done?" she coked the words out. "What have you become?"

Blank eyes rounded on her with fain curiosity, the kind one might lend a passing cloud.

"Hmm? You're here too, Kaguya? No. Not Kaguya. Lesser." she flinched at his damning words. "Fascinating."

Quick as a flash those eerie blank eyes swung back to her other half, regarding him with far more menace. "So! Brought the bitch along for a ride, did you? How'd you manage that? What, she your daughter or something? Are you really that naive? Doesn't that get old?"

Naruto didn't deign to answer.

"Fair enough. Oh! I see those robes you're wearing." that smug smile turned cruel as the Beast began to circle them." Finally made Hokage, did you? Good for you! Did you ever get around to fucking anyone? No? Run the village into the ground?" that ghastly visage snapped into his face, forehead pressing against his own. "No? _Burn _it to the ground, then?

Still, he refused to give him the satisfaction.

"Silent treatment, eh? Well, if she's here...Guess that makes you, what, Foreigner then?" the smile that bloomed as he danced away was almost euphoric by comparison. "I've always wanted to try one of those."

...you won't. Not today."

"Ahahaha! So he speaks! After all! I was starting to think they plucked out your tongue or something."

Laughter burst from the self-proclaimed Beast all at once, sharp and high and so very _mad. _It was the cry of a man who had been twisted so far beyond the pale as to be unrecognizable. One who'd had more than just a bad day, but a bad life from the very beginning. Pity shriveled up in him and he felt the sudden, overwhelming urge to pummel some sense into this man. He was him, after all. A warped and twisted version of his psyche that he'd never wanted to see, let alone face, but it was still him underneath all that blood and scales.

"I'm grateful, really." the monster murmured between giggles, heedless of their boiling fury. "You caught me at a good time. I feel almost...giddy, after this kill. Feels good to have an easy victory after the last one. These idiots were out here alone, away from the world. They let it burn so they could enjoy a few more years together. Did you know that? If they'd stood there ground and fought, that would've been a better way to go. More noble, don't you think so...

Bloodied teeth flashed out at them.

_...Naruto?"_

Foreigner struck.

Looking back, he couldn't quantify what made him move; revulsion, disgust, or simple anger. It could've been any one of them. But it didn't change the outcome. Clenched knuckles barreled into the side of the Beast's whiskered cheek with all the force of a hurricane, shattering his jaw, rendering his right eye a stark scarlet smear, and his nose a twisted mess of cartilage and bone alike. He made no move to defend himself, much less evade as he tumbled backward, half of his visage rendered a pulpy mass.

Anyone else would've died.

Not the Beast.

"Good god!" his doppelganger crowed, flopping on his back like a drunken crab as he clutched at his ruined face. He was already healing, already able to speak by the time Naruto reached him again. "I _felt_ that one! What are you, a Grand Servant or something?!"

"No." A hand closed around the ratty jacket he wore, jerking him upright. "And you're not me."

Beast spat in his face and he spun away, startled.

"Oh, but I am!" the monster laughed, climbing back to his feet to leer at him. "I'm the one bad day you never had, Naruto." a lone finger rose to accuse him, jabbing at his chest. "I'm the nightmare that haunts your sleep, the whispers as you creep. I'm that tiny, little voice in the back of your head that says burn them all. You just don't know it yet. But you will. You all will. The others knew too, before the end."

Kaguya's hand scythed out and half the creature's body-most of its right side-vanished in a grisly spray.

Still it continued to chuckle.

"Why aren't you dead?"

"You have _your_ cells to blame for that, my dear." The Beast chuckled, already regenerating what it had lost. "But if its any consolation..._that hurt like hell."_

"How many of you are there?" She snapped at him.

Something dawned in those dull eyes then, a spark of realization.

"You came alone." Beast reared back, guffawing harshly in spite of their shared scowl. "You didn't bring anyone else with you. Not Saber, not Kurama, not even the slacker who calls himself Faker these days. No. Of course you didn't. They're too focused on their own escapades. You...idiots. You're not a Grand Servant. You're not an agent of a the Counter Force. You're just an idiot carrying around the dying embers of a goddess. A fool prolonging the Age of the Shinobi." his cackles redoubled as the blond planted his feet and grit his teeth. A long, drawling and twisted laugh leaped out of him.

_**"Foooooooool!"** _the word rattled the very world itself. "You two barely qualify as a Servant at all. What can you possibly do to me?!"

Naruto sighed. "Kaguya."

The little goddess perked up. "Yes?"

"Get off." the words were a growl. "Now."

A mad giggle followed as she clamored off of him.

"We're seriously going to do this, the? You're going to fight me?"

Foreigner silently took a stance, one foot sliding forward, his right fist cocked back.

"Very well, then. I'll humor you," the false Beast snickered. "I took Gunner first, but the former managed to get off a message before he was...converted." an ugly tongue flicked out, licking bloody lips. "Even seems like another took his place somewhere out there. Pity. Couldn't eat Launcher; he was mostly metal. Alter Ego...well. The less said about that one the better. Bit off more than I could chew, there. But I learned."

Something shifted his peripherals as the shadows began to stir.

"As you can see," a clawed hand rose to pick at his teeth, "I just finished with Gatekeeper. Keeper of what, I ask you? He wasn't even guarding anything. Just a reincarnated Servant trying to hide with his family. He gave up his power for them; by the time he reclaimed it, they were already dead. Shame about the kids, though. Least I got a decent puppet out of him."

Kaguya stiffened. "Children...?"

"Oh, aye, there were two of them." His head bobbed. "Twins, can you believe the luck? Don't worry, they never felt any pain. I'm merciful like that."

Kaguya shrieked; this time it was Naruto who held her in check.

_"Monster! I'll kill you!"_

"Monster, am I?" that twisted head tilted as though she were an ant about to be squashed beneath his boot. "Perhaps you should speak more softly to me then, little one. Monsters are dangerous and these days, Servants are dying like flies. And now...the two of you." he laughed, and the world shook with him. "How nice for dinner to seek me out for once. Ruins the thrill of the hunt, I suppose, but beggars can't be choosers. And your poor papa brought you as a snack for me! How thoughtful of you. Its been awhile since I had a _god_ for dinner."

The diminutive deity shrank back and Naruto stepped forward to shield her with his body. "You won't touch her."

"Oh, but I will!" The Beast cackled, fingers sharpening into claws. "You have no say in the matter! You're just meat in the grinder. Fuel in the tank."

...then we have nothing left to talk about." Foreigner declared coldly, eyes pulsing white. "I'm sorry, but I can't be the one to save you. I don't think you even want to _be_ saved."

Remarkably, that actually triggered a new reaction from the creature; because Beast's visage went terribly, horribly still. It was the worst thing he could've said. Foreigner couldn't have produced a more profound reaction had he walked right up and slapped the creature in the face. For the Beast had stopped smiling. For the first time since they'd met, that mad smile was nowhere to be found. Beast twitched. Jerked, like a puppet severed from its masters string, as though that last word had wiped all manner of thought from its mind and left naught but static behind.

"Saved?" he croaked out the word as though it were poison.

Then his expression turned thunderous.

_**"SAVED?! ME?!"**_

In a heartbeat the illusion of humanity shattered; revealed was the monster in all its ghastly glory. Gods, he couldn't even begin to describe it, only that it was large and scaled and might have been a fox once; before the change had begun. Kaguya yelped, a rare expression of genuine fear overtaking her visage as she took shelter behind his back in the face of his fury. The other half of Foreigner gazed calmly up at it and prepared the one countermeasure he knew; yet held it in reserve as the creature slammed its slavering maw into him, forcing him to grind his feet against the dirt as towering teeth snapped a thin inch from his face.

_**"You think I wanted to be like this?!"**_ Rancid breath filled his nose; hot, fetid air blasting his hair with the foul stench of decay. **"This monster? This thing?! THIS FUCKING THING?! NO, YOU IDIOT! AND YOU SAY I DID NOT WANT TO BE SAVED?! MY WORLD TOOK EVERYTHING FROM ME! MY WIFE! MY CHILD! NEARLY ALL MEMORIES! EVERYTHING! AND NOW EVERYONE WILL KNOW MY PAIN!"**

"Even...so! That doesn't give you the right to torment others!"

A massive slitted eye had time enough to comprehend Naruto's smile; to widen just little Kaguya blazed in and grabbed its owner by the tail. The Beast stiffened, trying to coil back on itself and snap her up in its jaws, but it was already too late. With a singular herculean effort she stomped a foot down and threw it over her shoulder as though it were naught but a sack of grain. In the same instant, Foreigner released his hold on the muzzle of the creature, freeing it entirely. Yowling, it slammed into the sundered shack and tumbled down the ruined hill, wreaking havoc on its minions as it flailed like the abomination it was.

It was still flailing when Foreigner and his ward dropped onto its back to drive him deep beneath the earth.

**"Where the hell did that come from?!"** A distant growl rose from the ruined earth miles below. **"Where the fuck am I?! When I get out of here...!"**

Calmly, the stray Servant raised one palm toward the beast-shaped crater; with a gleeful grin, Kaguya seized his free hand and mirrored him only a moment later.

**"BASTARD!"** The Beast bellowed below them, shaking the world with its infuriated roar. **"Just you wait until I get up there! You're dead! Do you hear me?! DEAD!"**

It was utterly, summarily, ignored.

"Thought I told you to stay back." Naruto sighed, raising his voice to be heard over the rising swell of the light. A soft, graceful hum answered him, small fingers squeezing his aching hand as he gazed down into blackness and the beast struggling to rise within. He had time enough to risk a glance at his ward before it became visible again.

"You did." Those peerless white eyes gazed up at him. "You tell me to do a lot of things, papa. Doesn't mean I have to obey them all."

"Together, then?"

Her hand squeezed his.

"Always." she chirruped happily.

Exasperated, he planted a palm against his forehead.

"Jeez. You really can be a handful sometimes, you know that?"

On its own, the tailed beast bomb was a vicious technique by itself; one capable of blasting through mountains like driftwood. Few-if any-could withstand a direct hit. This was something...worse. Much worse. Heralded by the warped will of the universe and called to task by the unlikely entity beneath it, the dying spark of divinity rekindled itself all at once to merge with the attack. Building in a rising crescendo of black and violet light, only narrowly held in check by two pairs of palms, it swelled with each passing moment.

**"H-Hold on! Just one second!" **A nervous thread wove itself into the Beast's threats. **"Now I see a light...?"**

A heartbeat passed.

Foreigner snarled as one.

_"Walk towards it, you bastard!"_

The ensuing blast rattled the world.

**"Hey! Wait, damnit! Stop! I said time out! What the heeeeeeeeell?!"**

Everything shook; no, it would be better to say that all of creation cried out in triumph; a world's worth of wrath blazing down into the dark to hammer home against the ghastly ghoul trapped in the pit. The Beast's cry trailed off into a snarling shriek and Foreigner found itself forced to leap way to the hill lest they be consumed by the light of their own transcendent attack.

And the smoke cleared.

Incredibly, they found that the False Beast was still alive yet; they could see its head and shoulders still writhing at the base of the hill in the shallow valley below, struggling to pull itself up from the crater created by the blast. Even from here, one could see its movements were sluggish by comparison when one measured them against the eerie movements of moments before. Moreover it seemed...bound somehow, as though something were actively restricting its movements. Naruto's frown deepened further still at the sight.

"Did you...?"

"Gravity seal." the little one wiggled her fingers to reveal the mark inscribed upon her palm. "Slapped it on him when I grabbed him, earlier. He'll be breaking free any minute now, but its bought us some time."

"Clever girl."

The little one lifted her chin to preen. "Aren't I? You may shower me with headpats."

He granted her request and eyed some of the darker shapes lurking near the hill, watching the skeletal creatures rally to their master's side in a rising black tide. How many of them were down there? How many more yet hid themselves away? Hundreds? Thousands? They just kept coming, monsters and skeletons and abominations pulling themselves from the muck to aid the one who had corrupted them. Ugly. Sheer numbers might well do what skill alone could not. Even they would eventually exhaust themselves against a limitless army of that size.

Yet for some reason, the mud didn't reach the hill.

Here, this last bastion of humanity yet held.

"We still have the authority the Grail gave us for this." Kaguya nudged him quietly. "If we absolutely have to, we could summon another-

"That's cut our power in half. Not a good idea." he shut her down immediately. "Can you purify any of them?"

"Maybe?" she tilted her head as the Beast continued to wriggle and writhe in the mire below. "I'm not sure. Most look too far gone for me to do anything but put them out of their misery. Maybe a Servant, if they're not too far gone?"

"So you could, then?" Naruto asked.

"Do you think he'll be angry enough to send some of them out?" Kaguya inquired, grabbing his hand again. Sure enough, the Beast was righting itself, breaking free of the brief curse she'd laid upon it. "With our blessing, we should be able to purge one or two of them, if we can at least touch them. Assuming they aren't bound too tightly."

"What did I tell you about referring to yourself as we?" Naruto snorted. "Still, he'd have to magnificently stupid to do something like that."

"Indeed." her head bobbed in agreement. "If he were smart, he would drown us in numbers, wear us down, then strike."

"But he won't. He's too angry with us now."

They shared a look and smiled.

_"Yes."_ they chorused.

No sooner had they spoken than the creature flickered and a man picked himself in place of the Beast.

Another flicker brought him back to the hill before them.

**"Sorry about that little outburst."** his voice didn't change, it made no further attempt to conceal what it truly was; for it had long since lost the thin veneer of humanity he pretended to. **"I tend to get...carried away when people use that word. But you're right though, enough stalling. Would you kindly die?!"**

With those words, the world began to stir around them.

Something-someone-rose up out of it, oozing shadow and flame. Then another.

Another.

And another.

Yet another still.

One might've been a man once, but his eyes were dull, his skin scorched by flame. A pale cloth concealed his eyes, yet that unseeing gaze snapped toward him the moment he moved. Could he..hear them somehow? Had he been blinded after the fact? Or was it some other fell sorcery he didn't understand? And there, a pair of vicious, massive pistols in his belt. Gunner, then.

"I'm...sorry." it recited the words on rota, as its body twitched and Foreigner fought down a flinch. "Illya...couldn't save you. Sorry...so...sorry...

"Whose Illya?" Kaguya whispered.

Naruto offered a helpless shrug, because the muck was stirring again.

Beast's second Servant rather resembled a twisted, corroded robot that had been smashed apart and put back together. Was...was that supposed to be a mechanical version of him? if so, the replica was rather startling at that. Crouched on all fours, it managed to look downright feral despite its blank, unassuming visage. He twitched and that metal faceplate whipped towards him with a dull whir. He was going to assume that this was likely Launcher at that. Ceaseless coded gibberish babbled its speakers, and he felt nothing but pity for it.

The last was worse by far, if only because he was...old.

Someone who had lived life and grown through age. A worn and torn leather curiass lay strapped against his body, concealing worn grey cotton and a weather-beaten brown shirt. Gatekeepr, probably. He held no cord or weapon in hand beyond a worn wooden plough, yet something told him he was the most dangerous of the bunch, despite his wrinkled visage and gray hair. In contrast to the others he was almost alive. Blue eyes widened at the sight of them, only to narrow a heartbeat later. He turned his head and spat on the ground with a heated hiss.

"Well." the word escaped him on a croak. "Today's certainly been an interesting day, hasn't it? First I'm killed by myself; now I'm fighting myself. And here I thought I'd seen it all. Saber would laugh if she saw this."

Foreigner choked. "You're...aware?"

"Oh, as much as I can be given the circumstances." the farmer shrugged as his companions twitched and shuddered beside them. "I'm sure it won't last. I can already feel my mind starting to go." he tilted his head, gave a slow blink, and sighed. "That girl by you...that's Kaguya, isn't it? Named one of the twins after her. Good to see her again. Brings back memories."

"What?" the little goddess blinked.

Gatekeeper scoffed. "Why the long face? You raised me. Only feels right to name someone after you. Didn't she raise you too, kid?"

Naruto blinked.

...no?"

"Hmm." Gatekeeper turned and spat again. "Strange times indeed. Multiverse theory really is a bitch."

"I don't understand, how are you so...

"Detached? On the contrary. I'm furious. That little shit killed my family. I want to bury this plough in his eye. But if I let myself give into emotion now, I'll end up like Gunner over there." his grey head jerked sideways. "A stuttering wreck with no sanity left to him. No, thank you. I'll hold onto my mind while I still have it, if only to spite him. Don't mourn me. Don't feel bad about this, you're doing us a favor." that ancient visage creased in a careworn smile. "We're already long dead. There's no saving us, not anymore. Just...kill us. Avenge us. Lay us to rest."

**"That's enough of that!"** the Beast interjected with another command. **"You've run your mouth already, old man. _Now be silent."_**

Gatekeeper glowered, but his body obeyed.

He immediately dropped his weapon and started using sign language.

**"Oh, for the love of me! Stop that! Right now! No communication! None whatsoever!"**

Three more Servants joined them then, their bodies likewise blackened by the mud of the Grail and the Beast who had consumed it.

One looked little more than a ten-year old girl with strange armor and blond hair, so fade as to be nearly unrecognizable. The fifth was barely a shadow, like an idea scarcely even formed before being cast aside. The last stirred a strange semblance of nostalgia in Foreigner, as if he were looking at some faded mirror image of himself, cracked and twisted by time. Kaguya's reaction was slightly more profound. She would have flown at that one in a fit of fury, were it not for his hand on her shoulder, clamping down with startling force. Even then she flung an enraged glance over her shoulder, but Naruto's grip remained ironclad.

Tainted and twisted, they started forward at a slow, inexorable gait. After a long moment's consideration, Beast waded in after them like a proud puppeteer.

There were seven of them in all, Foreigner realized.

Including Beast, they faced seven corrupted iterations of himself.

It was almost poetic, in a horrible, ghastly sort of way. His body tensed at the sight.

**"One bad day can wreck a world." **Beast cackled. **"But one bad week? That can destroy a multiverse. Prepare to be assimilated."**

"You really think you can win this?" Kaguya hastily skittered back, drawing up beside her own companion. She sounded afraid.

**"Seven against one seems like good odds."** The Beast beamed bloodily. **"Any last words?"**

Foreigner sucked in a deep breath through his teeth.

"Seven against one? No. Now its even."

His body tensed, lungs burning.

And the battle began.

**A/N: I own no references, and I certainly don't own the "FOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!" bit from A Hat In Time.**

**There we go. A scene that never happened, restored for your viewing pleasure. A fragment of time, of sorts. Hope you enjoyed it.**

**Which-or what?-would you like to see next? I have all manner of fragments lying around that I'd love to regale you with, but alas, duty calls! I've got a double shit ahead, and I would dearly love to read your reviews when I return tomorrow. And when I say fragments, yes, NGH-otherwise Not Going Home-Naruto is loosely connected to this as the instigator of it all.**

**I'm sure some of his counterparts would LOVE to have a chat with him.**

**Now then, by all means...tell me what you want to see.**

**So In the Immortal Words of Atlas.**

**Review, Would You Kindly?**

**No previews~!**

**Not today~!**

**R&R~!**


	2. A Most Unlikely Friend

**A/N: Consider this a teaser of something to come.**

**And a happier bit at that!**

**Here we have a story idea that was never entirely fleshed out due to a concept I already had in place.**

**MIND YOU, its already happening in a sense; a chap called TM11 is going to do something similar with Sasuke sooner or later, and he has my full endorsement, as I'm actually curious to see what his story will look like!**

**After all, we have plenty of Servant!Naruto's already.**

**What's to stop the rest of the gang from getting in on the action?**

**So, yes, this is Avenger!Naruto being a grumpy little bugger, but not for very long!**

**Clearly this is a rough draft that never made it into "A Most Unlikely Avenger" but I wanted to share it with you all.**

**Who knows? This guy might become a Servant someday, if only for the sheer hilarity and hijinks that would ensue from their presence.**

**MILD Spoilers for A Most Unlikely Caster, but then again I wasn't terribly subtle about the hints that I dropped there, either. Lemme know what ya think!**

_"Do you...know him?"_

_"Nope. Never seen him before."_

_"That hurts, kid! You've been holding out on me!"_

_~?_

**Old Friends**

_"Give up yet, kid?"_

Avenger fought down a twitch in his right eye.

Bad enough that half the Servants in Chaldea claimed to know him, but this...this almost put a smile on his face. He'd nearly forgotten what it felt like to smile. He didn't _want_ to smile. He'd wanted nothing more than to scowl and storm off the moment he found himself face to face with the new arrival. Instead he found himself put in a headlock and wrestled into-then through-three separate wall. Which was mildly concerning, given that he was a Servant. Then again, so too was his would-be kidnapper. The newcomer had waltzed right up to him and when Naruto tried to_ waltz right off,_ he found himself in this...situation.

"Let go of me already!"

Jiraiya uttered a long, jaw-popping yawn.

"Not a chance!" A toothy grin flashed above him as the man tightened his grip. "C'mon now, smile! You're brooding more than the Uchiha!"

A low growl built in the back of the blond's throat.

His captor gulped. "Too far?"

_"Too far."_

In a single spectacular move the blond scythed his legs and bolted upright, driving his skull into Assassin's skull. His old mentor reeled, genuinely unprepared for the move, and in that instant he wriggled free and planted a clenched fist in the sage's stomach. The satisfying wheeze _did,_ however, bring a smile to his face as he straightened-

Right before his fellow Servant cold-cocked him right across the jaw and sent him spinning to the deck.

Holy hell, the old man hit harder than he'd expected! Really hard!

Vision swimming, it was all he could do just to prop himself up.

"Right then," a hand closed around his hair and jerked him upright. "I don't know what happened to make you this way, but you and I are going to have a talk-

"Are you now?" a painfully familiar voice intoned as his vision continued to swim. "Might I be allowed to join this conversation as well?"

Oh, no. No, no, no. Where the devil had she been hiding? Was she watching them the whole time? Just waiting for this?

"Stay out of this, Saber. 'S not any of your business." Naruto groaned aloud, to no avail.

"Wait, is that your girlfriend?!" Jiraiya squalled. "C'mon, kid! _Introduce me!"_

"Ho?" a golden grow rose ponderously. "What was that?"

_...nevermind. I'm good."_

**A/N: Aaaaaand there we have it, folks.**

**So...in the immortal words of Atlas.****..Review...Would Ya Kindly?**

**Fine, fine, a preview for you.**

**Hope it makes you smile!**

**(Preview)**

_"Stop those perverts!"_

_Jiraiya and Blackbeard were eerily silent._

_Then they pelted for the door like a pair of madmen. _

_"FOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLS! You'll never take us alive!"_

**R&R! =D**


	3. A Most Unlikely Meeting

**A/N: You know, I've had a bit of an epiphany.**

**Some people are just assholes.**

**For ever good person, there's at least ten more who live to hurt others. ****The reviews I got for A Most Unlikely Hero were certainly proof of that.**

**Pity party you say? Glad I almost got attacked in real life, you say? Don't give a fuck you say? Kill yourself, you say?**

**Now, I could go off on a rant and explode. But I won't. There's no need to. Because I understand now.**

**People...just don't care. How silly of me not to realize that. Downright foolish, really.**

**I don't think you quite comprehend what I'm talking about here.**

**Now, if folks well and truly want me gone for good...well. Why the hell am I even doing this, then? Why am I writing to cheer people up, when so many of those same people would gladly see me torn to shreds? I used to get joy out of writing. Now...now sometimes leaves a bad taste in my mouth; knowing I'm going to get bombarded when I post. So why bother? If my one greatest passion turns to ash, what do I have? What am I without writing?**

**Something to ponder I suppose. But I'm still alive. I don't think the world's done with me yet.**

**So here. Have this. It was going to be a new story for you all. A surprise.**

**It WAS going to be a different take, an emotional one.**

**A different outcome, one that never was.**

**Now...well its nothing. Its dead.**

**A fragment that faded.**

**They've killed it.**

_"Death comes for us all, in the end._

_Short or tall, weak and small, without exception._

_Some of us are ready; prepared to meet it. Others are not._

_We all meet it. There can be no escape from it. Even heroes grow old._

_Legends wither. Legends die. Legends are lost. Some die alone. Some...some die together._

_And some...some are reborn. Some rise from the ashes like a phoenix. Others gutter out. Never to be seen again._

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Meeting**

_"So this is where you went."_

She found him on the edge of the horizon.

An endless white expanse that stretched out into eternity itself; void but for the sensation of hard marble against her boots. The sound echoed hollowly as she strode toward him, reverberating endlessly into the void. No one was left to hear it; here, at the end of the world. Not even the Throne itself. She wondered if he could hear her approach. Perhaps he did. Perhaps he simply wasn't paying attention. Perhaps he was. Who knew? Her target simply sat there, staring at the last remnants of a dying sun.

"Are you going to run again?" she called out into the silence. Only her echo answered.

He made no move to escape, though it was well within his power.

After all, he'd been half gone the last time she'd seen him, well on his way to becoming a monster. A True Beast. An abomination-some said against his will-one that would have to be put down. There was no cure for what he was becoming, no wish that could undo what had been done. He did not hate the world. On the contrary. He loved it. That had been his undoing. He was too good. Too kind. Too pure. It made him all the easier to twist and corrupt, to taint, bit by bit, so slowly that no one noticed until it was too late. But he noticed. As did she.

So he'd left.

Just...vanished one day.

Took the Grail with him and fled, never to return.

Okita had been hunting him ever since. She'd been hunting for...well. A terribly long time. That word lost its meaning centuries ago. There had been others with her-three of them-in the beginning, but in the end each had fallen away by some means or another, be it violence or despair, exhaustion, or simple heartbreak. Still she'd continued on. Because she'd made a promise. She'd always tried to do the right thing, no matter the cost. She wanted to protect people. Him. The world.

Now she was here to bring an end to things. To him.

She owed him that much at least.

She would give him rest.

Her stride never faltered, indeed, that golden gaze remained fixed on that faint orange-black speck in the distance. Ashen hair swayed about her with every step, and a tan hand absently rose to swat a stray strand out of her eyes. She paused, confused. Tan? Her skin had been pale when all this began. Before the Counter Force. Before him. She'd walked to the very ends of the earth, until she could walk no more; then she'd kept walking in spite of what they said. In defiance of reality and time.

And here at last she had found him.

This close, she could see his coat, a loose, weather-beaten thing draped over his shoulders. It had been black and orange, once. Before time and tears had rendered it a shredded mess.

She remember that coat; remembered him draping it around her shoulder. His lips warm on hers, warm like his jacket-_no!_ Okita clamped down on the fond memory before it could consume her. _Don't think about it!_

"Drifter." she spoke his nickname first, unable to say his true name. It caught in her throat, lodging against her tongue. Then it burst from her all at once.

_"Naruto."_

His back tensed.

"Geez," his voice cracked, rough and dry from lack of use, "Persistent, aint'cha?"

She could've drawn her blade then and there; struck him down and been done with it. Instinct screamed at her. So too, did her heart. This close, he looked almost human. It was only the slight tensing of his shoulders-an eerie aura of dread stemming from this facade-that told her otherwise. Even now he clung to his human form, like a drowning man clutching at a lifeboat. Would he change if she stabbed him? Would the Beast be revealed at last? Would she know the truth?

Peering closer, she glimpsed his bandaged right arm beneath the coat, saw the claws jutting through the cloth and leading toward the shoulder in an unholy union of crimson scales and pale flesh. Ah. So he was still trying to hide it. To stop it. His left clutched the Grail, concealed in his lap. Somehow he still had it-still hadn't used it-after all these years. Why was he still holding onto it? It was pure. Untouched by the crude corruption pulsing through his veins like sludge. It could grant him anything, short of a cure.

She had to move. Had to strike now before she hesitated.

When the ageless Alter Ego drew her blade, however, he _looked_ at her.

Mismatching eyes creaked open over his shoulder and her heart skidded to a shuddering halt.

"You haven't aged a day, you know? Its not fair." A hand flew to her face when she saw...well, the state of _his_ face.

One of them-the leftmost orb-remained a glistening sapphire, blue as the purest skies. It was the other that concerned her; for in his right the red slitted eye of a monster that gazed back at her, the corruption even now sinking its pallid veins across the length of his face. He'd tried to bandage that too at some point, but must've given up, for the cloth had been left to hang loosely around his neck.

"What happened to you...?"

_"Happening."_ he chided her lightly, but there was a strained note to his voice. "Won't be much longer now. If you've come to kill me, now's the time."

Gilgamesh's power, the bulk of it, had been sealed in him as well. Maybe that was why he'd become this. Gone mad.

What he couldn't defeat he'd chosen to seal. And now that the moment had come...

She could. She should. She didn't.

Wordlessly, Okita sheathed her sword, sat beside him, and tucked her head into his shoulder. He didn't fight her. Didn't try to escape. If anything he deflated. She couldn't do it. Seeing him again after all these years was too much; it sapped her resolve even as she struggled against it. She was just so damn happy to see him, and yet she couldn't bring herself to harm him.

"Found you." she murmured softly, threading her hand through his.

A careworn sigh answered her. He sounded...tired.

"So you did, girl." he croaked, his voice weak. "So you did. How'd you find me?"

"Remember what you told me that day?" she prodded. "I am yours. And you are mine."

Naruto croaked out a laugh. "Never give up, huh? I'm glad its you. Didn't think I'd see you again, you know? Where are the others?"

The silence proved telling.

He laughed again, but it wasn't bitter. Only weary. "Gave up on me, did they? That's alright. I hope they're happy, wherever they are these days."

She felt her lips tremble and bit down hard, stubbornly riding out the wave of emotion even as it threatened to drown her. This...this wasn't who she'd come to kill. Naruto was thin. Frail. Weak. He looked half-starved and not at all the threat she'd thought him to be. He looked...afraid. Not angry, not scornful, or even disappointed that she'd gone to such efforts to track him down. Now he trembled against her and she found her mind cast back to the moment of their first meeting. It hadn't been all that different from this, though she dared not dwell on it. Naruto was trembling again.

"Will it be quick?" his voice was nearly a whisper.

Okita felt a tooth crack in her jaw. "...yes." she reassured him. "It will be."

"Will there be pain?" his hand jumped against hers and her heart lurched painfully next to her core.

Try as she might she couldn't bring herself to answer that. Of course there would be pain. Dying sucked. Dying _hurt._

"No." the Servant lied through her teeth, fingers fisting around the war-scarred hilt of her blade. "You won't feel a thing. I promise."

Naruto seemed to consider that for a moment. A small, tinny cough shook his shoulders. "So this is it, then? I admit...I'm afraid. I don't want to die."

She sobbed. "I know. If there was another way-

And an idea struck her like a wave.

Did he have to die?

Truly?

Naruto couldn't be cured. Couldn't be saved. He was dying of this poison as surely as age, even if he didn't show it. Conversely, she wouldn't last much longer herself. Even if she did, she didn't want to live a life like this at the end of the world, a life alone, forgotten, unmourned. But they had a way to fix that, didn't they? It was sitting in his free hand even now, pulsing softly. The Holy Grail. Once large, now made small. That golden cup, brimming with magical energy gathered over years upon years of war and strife, then allowed to mature and age throughout the centuries. It could grant almost any wish. Perhaps even two.

In a single fluid motion she reached around him and seized the Grail; it came alive in her hands, giddy to be used after so many years.

Naruto peered over her shoulder, red-blue eyes widening.

"What are you doing?"

Her eyes burned. "Fixing this."

He nearly didn't have time to ask why. Or why.

"Oi!" he thrashed in her arms. "Knock it off! Seriously! Stop! You'll destroy yourself!"

Okita willfully ignored his protests and held him back with one arm as she threaded a thought through to the Grail, asked if such a thing-if her wish-was possible. She daren't speak it aloud. Not with Naruto leaning against her shoulder. Even so, the Grail's response nearly caused her to drop the darn thing outright, such as her shock. Credit where it was due, the Grail didn't waste any time. Scarce had she sucked in a breath than she felt something shudder to a halt in her chest. For there to be new life, the old one had to die. That was alright. If it meant rebirth, she was more than happy to die in his arms.

"Bye-Bye, Master. I love you." she murmured. "I'll see you again. Promise."

Naruto sighted softly into her shoulder. "I'll hold you to that."

She held his hand until the bitter end.

Even as he felt herself fade.

And then there was light.

**A/N: Yes, that was Okita!Alter.**

**There. Hope you liked it, such as it is.**

**It is HEAVILY implied that they both used the Grail to reincarnate.**

**As in to start new lives. So...happy ending? Yes? No? Maybe so? Who knows.**

**You'll get the Jiraiya bit in the next "chapter" of sorts. If I'm still around. My health has gotten worse-stress does that to you-and**** who knows? I might make this into a story variation someday years from now when I wrap the others up. If this sickness doesn't take me. If I live.**

**So by all means. Feel free to review, comment, and do as you like. Or don't. Do as you please.**

**No previews. Not this time. Forgive me, but I'm in no mood to give them at the moment. Have a nice day/evening.**

**Regards,**

**~Nz.**


	4. A Most Unlikely Game

**A/N****: So! We were having some site problems for a while there, but everything seems to be back in order for now. **

**What we have here was one of the bits for the _Tenth_ upcoming chapter of "A Most Unlikely Berserker" but it never quite shaped up the way I wanted it to. After a number of false starts I finally found my rhythm and got to work. But this bit was just staring at me with those blasted puppy-dog eyes, BEGGING to be used. I don't like writing words only to throw them away, you know?**

**So here we go.**

**I'm also doing a bit better nowadays.**

**I went full Paul Bunyan on a couple of trees in my backyard.**

**Right, so ya'll are getting a surprise soon.**

**I won't say what, because that'd ruin it.**

**So here, have a fragment of sorts!**

**REVIEW FOR IT FEEDS MY ENGINE OF CREATION!**

**We're following the_ two day_ rule here, if folks don't like this, it'll be gone by then. Don't believe me? It already happened to Launcher and Gatekeeper...**

_"Swing and a miss!"_

_"No fair! You cheated! You...cheaty cheater!  
_

_...that's not even a word, Mordred. You know that, right?_

_No! You do not get to ruin this, zombie! LEMME HAVE THIS DAMNIT!"_

_~?_

**I Want to Play a Game**

_"Base...ball?"_

Naruto planted a hand over his mouth to stifled a small smile. Even then a small snicker sailed out, despite his best efforts to restrain himself. Mordred's head tilt was adorable enough in her casual clothes, but when his fellow blonde's confusion was mirrored by that of Jack and Atalanta, it took nearly all he had just to keep his thoughts from dissolving into full-throated laughter. He must've failed too; because Archer absolutely _glared _bloody red daggers at him.

...you're mocking us, aren't you?" the huntress scowled.

"Noooooo no, no, no," Berserker shook his head. "Not at all. This is an actual sport."

No one answered, the afternoon sun silently beating down on their backs. Somewhere in the distance, a cricket chirped.

"Seriously!" he guffawed, wiping a mirthful tear from the corner of his eye. "I'm not pulling your legs. I just want to play a game, you know?"

"Sounds spooky when you put it that way." Mordred stuck out her tongue. "Are you sure this isn't a trick or something?" a hand planted itself on her hip. "Seriously?"

_"Bite me, Saber."_

Sure enough, said Saber stumbled into a sputtering squawk as her her cheeks burned crimson.

"Now, then!" Naruto declared, spinning away from his fellow Servant, "The rules are simple.

He outlined them in simple, concise terms. Remarkably, they listened.

He'd etched a crude diamond of sorts into a field some miles outside of Trifas, staffed and stocked with the few clones he could safely create outside of combat. Then he'd dragged his allies out here. As to the gloves, ball and bats...well. Surely no one would miss such things. He'd be returning them come morning. And if someone wanted to kick up a fuss in the meantime they could bite him, too. It wouldn't end well for them. And if some squirrely Servant of Black tried to interrupt their game they'd be in for a rude surprise at that.

What?

They weren't breaking any rules.

Their Masters had told them to take a day off.

They _were _taking a day off. Low power only, no Noble Phantasms.

If said day happened to consist of a super-powered game of baseball...who would know? He smiled at the thought. "Any questions?"

Three hands shot up immediately.

Naruto facepalmed.

"Seriously? Am I the only one even vaguely familiar with this sport?"

"Then teach us," Atalanta shot back. "The only way to learn is through experience."

"So who goes with who?" Mordred piped up, a snarky grin overtaking her features. "I call dibs on the zombie!

"Yeah, what are the teams?" Jack chorused, unwilling to be left out. Quick as a flash she darted forward and grabbed his arm. "We want to be with papa!"

"Alright, then." he shuffled a curious Jack towards the pitchers mound and placed a bat in her little hands. "All you have to do is swing at the ball when one of us throws it. Think of it like throwing a knife...

Mordred and Atalanta visibly twitched in the same moment. Naruto saw them out of the corner of his eye; a flicker of movement dancing in his peripherals. Little more than a slight tensing of their shoulders, but he recognized it all the same. Uh-oh. This had the potential to get bloody. Of course, they couldn't all be on the same team. Even with a small army of clones, that simply wasn't fair. Of course he couldn't rightly leave one of them by themselves and three against one was far from balanced, especially with the clones to back them up.

He was still pondering that dilemma when Fate decided to throw him a bone.

"Hey, there!" a new voice called. "What're you doing way out here?"

Now, Naruto certainly didn't recognize the armored young man materializing beside them in a shower of golden dust; he was as much a stranger to him as many members of the Black Faction. Thankfully, he didn't have to probe his identity. Atalanta rounded on the newcomers immediately, ears twitching. She didn't look...happy, per se, but she at least appeared to recognize one of them.

"Achilles?"

"Hey, sis!" the green-haired Rider snapped of a snarky salute. "Long time no see! You playing a game or something?"

Mordred swore softly.

"Oh for the love of...him too?!"

A muscle jumped in the blond's jaw.

"Anyone else hiding out there?" Naruto called out into the field with fraying patience. "Yes? No? Maybe so?"

"How kind of you to ask!" Shakespeare chimed, arriving in a swirl of mana. "Here I am!"

Semiramis was only a heartbeat behind him. "You rang?"

Naruto laughed incredulously.

_"I was joking!"_

Someone tapped him on the shoulder, and, exasperated, he whirled to find Karna's serene gaze meeting his baffled one. For a terrifying moment he wondered if Lancer had come to start their fight again, but no, that pale visage reflected none of the inner turmoil he was doubtlessly experiencing. In the end, he only sketched a humble bow.

...greetings.

"OHFORTHELOVEOFME!"

Mordred nearly yelped as a small red and white ball cannoned towards her. "What was that for?!"

"For bringing this upon me!" Naruto shot back. "Now line up, you lot! Its time to play!"

By the end of it all, the entire Red Faction had all but joined in the fray.

Ironically, more than a few Servants of Black entered as well.

But that's a story for another time now, isn't it?

**A/N: We're following the _two day_ rule here, if folks don't like this, it'll be gone by then.**

** There. Pure and sweet, with none of the sad bits from before.**

**So In the Immortal Words of Atlas...**

**...Review, Would Ya Kindly?**

**And enjoy the previews.**

**(Previews!)**

_Angra Mainyu cackled happily._

_"What, are we forming an Avengers club or something?"_

_Naruto and Jeanne exchanged a long, exasperated look between them._

_"What? Why're ya looking at me like that? I was joking! No! Stay back! Stay-YAAARGH?!"_

_Quite sometime later, Heracles had to extricate the Weakest-Servant-Ever from what remained of a wall._

**R&R~!**


	5. A Most Unlikely Girl

**A/N: (EDIT)**

**Do you want me to cry? Because I will. All these flames here and on A Most Unlikely Wraith are really upsetting...**

**So...Double update.**

**Yay. Whoo. Celebration.**

**Let me be blunt here real quick.**

**I. DO NOT. GET PAID TO. WRITE ANY OF THIS.**

**Zilch! Zero! Nadda! I don't get a single cent for any of this and I've HAD offers to write elsewhere-commissions and such-as well as other stuff for pay! Offers I've turned down! ****Instead I take time out of an arduous work week involving TWO JOBS and I bust my ass to get these stories out. Updates are planned for everything unless I DELIBERATELY say otherwise. I don't know what else to say here.**

**Why so serious, you ask? ****Moon Cancer got panned. Temptress got panned, too. ****Some folks were cool about it, listing reasons and such. Others...well, not so much. ****Don't believe me? I kept most of the nasty reviews around this time. Look. SEE THEM.**

**You know what? ****Just for that? ****You guys get another story. My gift to the fans, and a big 'ol middle finger to the flamers trying to tear me down. ****Go on, trolls. By all means. Keep poking the hornet's nest.**** I'll keep right on writing way up here just to spite ya daft buggers. ****Nasty words only add to the review count, and I can certainly take heart in the fact that there are those who care about me on this site. ****To those that have stuck with me through this like **_kuramathetranscened _**and others, ****thank you.**

**Oddly enough, some think Beast got to this one. Did he? Some Servants are slippery.**

**As ever, this'll be gone in _two days_ if folks don't like it, yadda yadda...**

**Alternate universe by the way, if that wasn't obvious.**

**This story is, clearly, a test, an experiment of sorts.**

**Yes, this is a Naruko story, sorry about that.**

**But its a oneshot so...just give it a chance.**

**Sorry if its short~!**

_"I...help people. Its what I do."_

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Girl**

_They tore my tongue out._

_Such is the price of defiance in my village these days. For speaking out against the great Lord Hokage and his new reforms, the illustrious Danzo ripped away my words in the town square and then threw me in a cell. I did not scream. I did not give them the satisfaction of my tears. Perhaps he thought this torture so would break me; make me yield to this glorious new regime of his and thus break the backs of those who resisted alongside me. Ha! He should know better by now. I've suffered worse wounds than this. So go ahead. Try to silence me. You'll find its not as easy as you might think. A kunoichi needs not her tongue to fight._

_When they stole my speech, I learned to sign._

_When they broke my arms I kicked them._

_When they broke my legs, I bit them._

_Throughout it all I never bent, and thus I was never broken. Though I would never speak again, their torture never broke me. __I throttled the first Root guard that tried to touch me, took his keys, and walked out. Root. Ha! And they call them Danzo's elite. The only thing elite about them is their incompetence. That old war hawk didn't realize I'd escaped until nearly a week later._

_I say again, Danzo, what WERE you thinking?_

_I found ways to act against him the moment I recovered enough to breathe without choking on my own blood. Ino helped. Thanks to her, together, we pioneered a jutsu in which I could project my thoughts to others and conversely, to hide them. Still not the same as speaking, but it served me well in the long run. I was known for helping people of all sorts by then, and he thought that by wounding me, maiming me with so many around to witness said maiming, that he would have control._

_It would've been wiser for him to take my hands._

_Danzo Shimura is many things, but wise? Clearly not one of them._

_Perhaps I'm not giving him enough credit. __Why should he fear me? I was only sixteen. _

_Little more than a whelp in his eyes, freshly returned to Konoha. Did he think his coup would last? Did he think he could kill Tsunade and get away with it? I'd never seen Jiraiya so angry. __No doubt Danzo believed I would serve as a living example of the price of defiance. Idiot. __The people loved me for it. Like my mother, they said. Defiant to the last. Was I? I don't know. I've never met her._

_But I HAVE met Jiraiya, and I was more than happy to help my old teacher beat that bastard into the ground. _

_People rallied to us in droves for it, yet somehow, I was the one they made Hokage years down the road. Damnit, Jiraiya!_

_Still. Being mute isn't so bad these days. I can still hear, still think, and my jutsu's proven quite handy. Shikamaru helps with the verbal orders._

_Lazy bugger. But he's MY lazy bugger. That's what matters._

_I never lost control of my temper throughout the ordeal, though the last of Danzo's supporters spun their web of lies. My will stood steadfast. Ironclad. I never let Jiraiya go and hunt Akatsuki. When Pain and the last of his ruined organization came knocking on our door, they found a VERY angry village and all her allies waiting for them. I was a Sage by then. Have you SEEN two angry sages fight? Nagato never stood a chance. Though the village suffered, we saved all we could. _

_I remember the old pervert shouting at me as I went around healing people with a broken arm. Perhaps things could have been different. Perhaps more of them could've survive if we'd found a better way. I tried. I healed a great many of people, even save Kakashi-sensei from chakra exhaustion, but we lost many._

_So...so many._

_I did not submit._

_I will not never give in, not ever._

_When "Tobi" and Sasuke came knocking we overwhelmed them, knocked the latter out flat and eradicated the former. That eye of his was even more troublesome. We lost Shino and Kiba trying to pin him down. But their sacrifice will never be forgotten. Thanks to them, Madara's infamous "Moon's Eye" plan fell apart. I met the Sage of Six Paths and accepted his mark, one I would carry for the rest of my life._

_There was no war afterward, only the mad machinations of an oily snake calling himself Kabuto. We dealt with all the same...though I managed to wriggle the secrets of a certain jutsu from him before I took his head. I pray I need never use it. Edo Tensei sounds...ghastly. No. Best to let the knowledge die with me._

_A bit anticlimactic, isn't it?_

_Sakura-bah!-got her precious Uchiha, but he'll never see the light of day now. Not when he's mad as a hatter...and blind as one too. His clan will die with him. __And you know what? I think I'm alright with that. I kept my promise. __She can have that emo boy for all I care. I've got other problems to deal with. Why do I have to get married all of a sudden, oi?! I don't wanna! Continue the Uzumaki line? Material for another book? I don't get it, why would you-wait. What do you mean another? Did you already write one about me and Shika?! Tell me you didn't. YOU DID?! I...you...how?! When did you even see...?!_

_..._

_..._

_..._

_...I'm going to clobber Jiraiya._

_I heal the innocent and condemn those who would cause chaos. __Right now? A certain pervert's looking plenty guilty to me._

_Look. I know I'm not quite right in the head. I get that. I...help people. Its what I do. What I was born for._

_If that makes me Mad, then so be. I'll help people. __Even if it kills me._

_Let me help. I'll keep helping, even after I die. I don't mind._

_Past, present, future...I'll help them all._

_I'm just a girl. Nobody special._

_So...please. Let me help._

* * *

_(...0o0o0...)_

* * *

At long last, the smoke cleared.

Kariya could feel the worms writhing in his veins in response to the new arrival in the pit, their agitation slowly killing him with each passing moment. He wanted to rip them out of his body, dash them against the stones and crush them underfoot. _He wanted them gone._ But he couldn't. He dare not. Without them he wouldn't have been able to conduct a ritual. There wouldn't BE a Servant. Without a Servant he couldn't fight in the War to come, and if he couldn't fight, he wouldn't be able to save Sakura.

His poor adorable little niece, cast aside by Tokiomi.

His throat locked up at the thought.

He had to to do this.

_Endure._

With this thought lurking at the forefront of his mind, Kariya gripped his injured arm and willed himself to stand. Zouken was watching him. He couldn't afford the slightest show of weakness. Not here. Not now. He had to be strong. Even if it cost him his body. Even if it cost him his mind. Even if it cost him his very soul.

This should be Berserker. Kariya knew this. Expected it even.

Instead, the girl he'd summoned barely came up to his shoulders at all.

Clad in a flowing-red white robe with a matching hat draped over her head, she didn't look the part. Even the garish crimson trousers and blue vest she wore beneath-doing absolutely nothing to conceal a rather generous bosom-lent the impression of Assassin or Rider, or even another class entirely. And yet Kariya felt himself go terribly still in her presence. As he looked on, she removed her hat and gave her head a hard shake as though a great weight had been lifted from her shoulders. Exposed were bright blue eyes framed by whiskered cheeks and sunny blond hair, the latter bound back in two twintails.

_"Well!"_ A sharp, sudden thought that was _not _his own snapped through his head like a whip. "_This is familiar! Are you the one who summoned me this time?"_

Though her mouth never moved, the little blond tilted her head, tossed her hair, and considered him for a long moment.

Her gaze swept past him, alighted on Zouken, and swung right back to him in an instant.

_"You don't look well. Here. Hold still. I have just the thing for you."_

She stepped forward to lay a hand against Kariya's chest.

_"Heal."_

That lone word resounded in his mind like a peerless bell. Soft yet ancient, otherworldly and commanding.

Incredibly, his body obeyed.

The worms writhing in his body didn't die so much as they ceased to exist. Eradicated beneath that gentle touch. He wanted to tell her to stop; that in performing this act of kindness she was destroying herself, eradicating the temporary circuits that sustained her form in this world. But he couldn't speak. Words failed him. All that emerged was a rattling gasp. as he stumbled away, clutching at his chest. He felt the link between him and this Servant waver tremulously for a moment, hold, and then...

...snap.

Their brief contract ended as quickly as it had begun. Kariya nearly screamed, such was his frustration. The Girl twitched, but gave no other sign of discomfort. Her body seemed to shimmer slightly, a faint glow overtaking her features, but her expression never wavered, not in the least. Instead she rounded on Zouken, who had thus far held his tongue despite his own misgivings. No longer.

"What have you done?"

_"You."_ the not-word was a hiss._ "Your soul is rotten. Wrong._

"Ho?" Zouken sniffed, leaning against his cane. "Telepathy, is it? How quaint-

_"Perish."_

This word was all jagged edges, harsh and cutting.

She turned her gaze on Zouken and the ghastly creature ceased to be in an instant as pair of strange spheres rose behind her back and stabbed forward. Rather than laugh, the old worm burst into shrieking white flame as his body fell apart. His death was quick and instant, the destruction of his soul assured. Kariya couldn't help but turn his gaze away as he beheld his father's true form; something in him wilted at the sight of so many snarling insects rotting away under the cleansing inferno, turning to naught but ash.

_"Don't move."_ the little blond pinioned him with a glare even as her body flickered. "I don't have much time."

He'd scarcely nodded before the young woman blurred-literally blurred!-away in an immediate golden streak of motion, pausing just long enough to pay him a passing glance. When she reappeared, a slumbering Sakura lay clutched tight in her arms, wrapped in the very cloak she'd been wearing. Almost as if she'd known exactly where to find her. As if she'd seen this before. Impossible. Absurd. Perhaps she'd simply sensed her somehow here in the crypt? Who know. Kariya's mind spun, still trying-failing-to find answers for this sudden turn of pace.

_"Here."_

She handed the slumbering girl off to him happily and numbly, he accepted.

By now the collapse had well and truly begun; she looked positively translucent compared to when he'd last seen her, bits of blue dust motes peeling off from her faltering form. Stumbling away from him like a drunkard at last call, she crashed headlong into a wall and groaned softly. A bandaged hand rose, waving him off when he tried to move to ehr side.

_"I've healed her."_ she informed him primly, dropping onto her haunches. "_The last few months won't even be a bad memory. You can send me away now, Master. I helped."_

"I...wait!" Kariya sputtered incredulously. "Who are you? Why did you do this? Surely you must have some sort of wish!"

She was too good, too pure to be a Servant. She was an angel. She'd saved him and Sakura both. And now she was content to die again. That...that was just too sad. He hadn't been able to do anything. All of it-all of this here-had been her doing. What had he done? Nothing. Less than nothing.

Berserker considered his words for a time.

Then, incredibly, she smiled.

_"Naruko. My name is Naruko. You already granted my wish this time, Master."_ Again came that brief mental caress, fleeting, almost mournful in its intimacy. "_Thanks to you, I was able to help the child I could never have. To save someone just like the man I once loved. You remind me of him."_ Those gentle blue eyes crinkled. "_You have the same kind of sou. Take care of her, will you? She deserves a better life than this. More than...this."_

Sakura stirred in his arms, but Kariya scarcely noticed.

Instead he choked on words that refused to come; He barely knew her, this wayward Servant, yet her words cut him to the quick all the same. More than Aoi ever had. So why did this feel so familiar? A strange, splitting pain stabbed at the back of his skull and he found himself experiencing a strange emotion. Nostalgia. As if he'd experienced this somewhere-somewhen?-before, though he had not the words to describe. The pain was an angry red wave, scouring all before it. Where? Where?! Where had he seen here before?! In another universe, a time not so different from this, perhaps. Were they allies? Enemies? Something else entirely?

He clutched at his skull.

"My head...feels like its splitting open!"

_"I know."_ came the answering sigh._ "Multiverse theory's a bitch, isn't it? You'll be alright in a moment. I'm nearly gone."_

Naruko rose slowly and stumbled over to him, shuffling on weak legs. She was crumbling now; there wasn't a thing he could do to stop it. Even as she reached for him, one of her arms crumbled away in a shower of wild blue dust, azure sparks tickling his nose as the rest of her joined it.

_"Listen to me, and listen good."_ she snapped, seizing his chin in one hand, forcing him to look at her in spite of his rampant fear and confusion._ "Avoid Tokiomi. At all costs. It doesn't end well whenever you go after him. I tried something different this time. I hope it works. Just take Sakura and go."_

"How do you know all this?"

_"Because we've done this dance before, Kariya." _Her lone arm closed around him and a startled Sakura in a loving embrace. _"Time and time again, an endless loop, a neverending series of deaths for you and I. You always forgot. I wanted to break the cycle. This was the only way I could think to do it. Only took me fifty tries." _a cheeky grin flashed out at him as that familiar, comforting presence brushed his mind. _"It was so nice to see you again...though this probably the last time." _Warm lips pressed against his forehead._ "I'll never forget you."_

Something painful welled up in the young man's throat again; this time he pushed past it.

"Wait." Realization dawned. "You, how did you know my name-

One final smile she gave him, one last gift to him.

His hand closed around open, empty air.

_"Find someone better than me."_

Still, Kariya tried to hold on as the last of her faded. He felt as though he'd forgotten something terribly, horribly important, something that he would remember if given the chance. His last sight of her was that same smile from before, a tiny mournful little thing. She looked so small. So terribly sad. A cold, bitter breeze swept through his body and his free hand fought naught but azure dust in its fist. And then she was gone and he _knew _she was gone and felt somehow lesser for it. She...this girl...had just given her second life for him, vanished without so much as a regret. Her sacrifice had given him victory. He'd won. And yet...and yet...!

He doubled over himself, clutching Sakura to his chest.

Why did it feel as though he'd lost everything?

A small, tiny sob arose in the silence.

And he was alone.

_"Don't go..._

**A/N: Yes, this is a oneshot.**

**Kudos if you know where the loop is from.**

**It ended on a happier note than intended at that.**

**Yes, it was sad, because I'm sad. Emotions affect my writing.**

**Its going to take a LOT of convincing to convince me to make it otherwise.**

**Remember, Servants can be summoned from the past, present, or even the future.**

**Make of these words what you will, but I did put a lot of work into this emotional scene, so...**

**...Review Would You Kindly?**

**R&R! =D**


	6. A Most Unlikely Teammate

**A/N: BAM! TWO UPDATES!**

**DO I HEAR A THIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIRD?!**

***EDIT* There we go! Let the series continue!**

**Could the trolls please stop? I've had to delete several-twenty five in this chapter alone!-anonymous reviews of nasty vitriol in the last hour or so and its making me upset. I've also had a rather nasty chap known as "Doom Marine" chanting at me to kill myself in the review section of my recent stories. Look if you don't believe me. Jokes on him though, that's not my real name.**

***Secondary Edit***

**I published this earlier, but the notification only came now? I don't know why? Notifications are being delayed again, but reviews are showing up? How many times has this been happening in the last month? No one is to blame for it of course, the site just goes wonky sometimes. Really kills my drive to write though...**

**Because this hasn't gotten any reviews for this chapter...**

**Only flames...cruel...nasty, vicious flames...**

**...and that makes me a sad boy.**

**So...reviews? Please?**

**I'll beg if I must.**

**T_T**

**As ever, this'll be gone in _two days_ if folks don't like it, yadda yadda...**

**Think of this as a different take, a scene that never happened in A Most Unlikely Card.**

**You could also call it a teaser or sorts. A test, even.**

**Do you like it? Please let me know.**

**Ever heard of Yakumo?**

**IIIIIIIIII have~!**

_"The road lies open before you, my dear._

_The paths are may, long and winding, they are._

_If you dislike them, then forge your own destiny. Simple as that."_

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Teammate**

_I killed my parents._

The knowledge threatened to tear Yakumo apart at the seams as she hugged her arms to her chest. Grief warred with guilt, tearing her apart. With each passing second she felt the memories return, the god awful truth of her sins weighing her down. They crept through her veins like poison, worse than a a genjutsu, because she couldn't dispel this one. Her illusions might well be real, but they couldn't change the truth of this world. Not for long. They couldn't bring back the dead, and they certainly couldn't undo what she'd done. They couldn't forgive her. She couldn't forgive herself.

I killed them.

I...I killed them.

_Ikilledthemkilledthemkilledthem..._

And yet with this news came opportunity. The chance to seize her dreams, to have all she'd ever wanted. A lone headband gleamed in her lap in the low light, a shining, metallic plate bound to a purple cloth. This was all she'd ever dreamed of. Before Kurenai-sensei. Before the fire. Before all the deaths. Before...well...everything.

Perhaps in another route, another time, someone would've been more gentle with the news.

Unfortunately for her, Mitarashi Anko was many things, but gentle was not one of them. She was a mistress of poison, a bit of a dango addict, and the master of tough love. Oh, she wasn't cruel, but if you were lying to yourself she'd slap you right out of it. The proof she'd presented to the girl-poor kid, having it just laid at her feet like that-was irrefutable, and quite possibly the only reason she hadn't gone berserk. Well. That and the sealing tag the jonin had slapped on her when she'd threatened to get out of hand.

"You don't like your destiny?" the snake mistress scoffed, flicking her forehead. "Tough. Then change it."

"I don't know how!" the words exploded out of her in a rush. "What am I supposed to do?!"

"Cant answer that for you, kid." all she received was a shrug.

_"That doesn't help at all!"_

Anko let her stew for what felt like an eternity.

Soft, miserable sobs echoed off the four walls of her prison as she wailed; as her broken heart curled in on itself and her body did the same. Yet Anko didn't leave her. Yakumo almost wished she would. She felt small now, her anger gone, gutted by the truth. She was tiny without it. Miserable. Alone. Her faint hopes were little more than a mere mote of dust compared to her grief. But grief never lasts forever. It hurts, it aches, it burns, but eventually it begins to fade. Minutes passed. Hours.

Eventually, her tormentor spoke.

...I'm taking a mission to a foreign country in the morning," the words were soft, deliberate, chosen with great care. "I'd like you to come with us."

Yakumo raised her head.

"Us?"

"I'm looking after a bit of a brat these days." the jonin smiling sheepishly and scratched the back of her head. "He's a bit like you, if a little older. He's stubborn, pigheaded..

-those sound like insults." Yakumo sniffled.

...yet underneath it all he's got a heart of gold." Anko talked over her, smiling. "I think you'd like him. You both come for a similar background. I think you'd get along." Unspoken was the silent hope that she harbored in her heart; she wanted-needed!-to give Naruto a connection the village; something or someone that would prevent him from hauling off and fleeing the moment they were out of the gates. He was a good person, but so too had her mentor been, int he begin. Perhaps if he had a connection, he wouldn't turn out like Orochimaru. She hoped. She prayed. Because if he did...they wouldn't be able to stop him. Of course, the girl knew none of this.

Yakumo dithered.

Someone...like her?

She wanted to say yes.

_More than anything_ she wanted to say yes.

The notion of having her dream, being with someone who understood...!

Yet a thorn of fear pricked her heart and held her back. "But what if I lose control?"

"You won't." A gleam of...something flashed through those hazel eyes, gone before Yakumo could grasp at it. "Trust me. He's more than capable of keeping you from going berserk. I dare say some of his friends might even know how to seal that "thing" inside you away for good." And it was the truth. Surely one of those "Heroes" would take pity on the girl.

Yakumo was listening intently now. "Friends?"

"Heroes, more like." the jonin groused, reliving a bad memory. "You won't believe it until you see them. Who knows? Some of them might take a liking to you."

The girl was silent for a long, ponderous moment. Weighing her words, her own actions.

Then she raised her gaze, and there was a fire in her eyes. "Tell me more."

Anko silently pumped a first.

All according to plan.

_Gotcha._

**A/N: Anko's a good girl, she's just loyal to Konoha. Whether that's a good or bad thing by this point...who can say?**

**And just like that, we get to see a scene that didn't quite happen, but may just arrive anyway.**

**As ever, this will be gone in _two days_ if folks don't like it. So there you are.**

** There we have it. A teaser of sorts for A Most Unlikely Card**

**Like it? Don't like it? Kill with fire? Tell me please.**

**So in the Immortal Word of Atlas...**

**...Review Would You Kindly?**

**R&R! =D**


	7. A Most Unlikely Light

**A/N: HA! Double Update!**

**Avenger's getting another one soon, but here be a fragment in the meantime. A scene that both happened and yet was left unseen. It didn't quite mesh with the chapter I had set up, so it found its way here. It DID occur, however, make no mistake.**

***EDIT***

**No reviews, eh? That makes me sad...**

**WARNING!**

**If you haven't read A Most Unlikely Exile, you'll be confused.**

**This is a fragment, a different ending given live in the most unlikely way.**

**There, now onto the show.**

***bawls happily***

**YOU GUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUYS!**

**Oh you magnificent glorious bastards, I don't' deserve you! You're the best! You know what you did! Thank you, thank you, thank youuuuuuuuuu! I don't know what I'd do without you and your kind words; the reviews are wind beneath my wings, they are life and happiness and keep me writing. ****As for the detractors...hmm. I suppose its time I addressed them.**

**Didn't I say that I had a plan for this series?**

**Instead I hobbled home from a double shift to get slapped with spam and such. Someone called it "over-saturation" but the truth is, I'm building a universe here. Rome wasn't built in a day-despite what Nero might say-but there won't be many more new stories if I have my way.**

**Now, then.**

**Lets address Berserker and Caster.**

**I haven't updated these two yet because the chapters. Are. LONG! We're talking an excess of ten thousand words and I want them to be just right! I'm not going to push out shoddy and rushed work, certainly not for those two! Don't even get me started on the sheer craziness of the others.**

**I've updated Saber, Lancer, Card, Rider, Master, Avenger, Collection-not to mention other genre-in the last few weeks and this is the thanks I get? Bah!**

**But since some people insist on spitting and cursing me at every opportunity...well!**

**Here. Another story. Out of spite for the trolls. Enjoy it. Have at ye.**

**Reviews are love. Reviews are life. Reviews make me strive.**

**As ever, this will be gone in **_two days_ **if folks don't like it.**

**References are glorious and I own nothing~!**

_"There is always light at the end of the tunnel._

_It is always darkest before dawn._

_Trust in that light._

_Hold to it._

_Fight."_

_~?_

**Light**

_Was this death?_

_Hanging in a dark abyss devoid of any semblance of sound or light, she could only drift. And in drifting, she saw...nothing. Only shadow. She could feel her fingertips-handslikeiceohgodwhy-and her toes-toomuchtoomuch-but she saw none of them, only the sensation of being-paininmyribswhyamibleeding-accompanied by tattered thoughts, fleeting flickers of images she both could and could not deny. She felt...torn. Broken. As if her very soul had been shattered into so many pieces that she couldn't properly recall the moment of her death._

_She remembered the pain._

_Shadow and...flame._

_Horrible teeth._

_ cannotbestopped-but_

_Bit by bit, moment after moment, she felt herself fading away. She felt...cold. Terribly, horribly cold._

_The_

_She didn't want it to end this way. She wanted to see him again; because she'd held him back. Kept him from reaching his true potential. He'd been so preoccupied with protecting her that he hadn't been able to fight with all his might. If not for her, he could've raged across the island like the tempest he was. Instead he fell. Or did he flee? She didn't know. There was no way of knowing. Only the darkness of death and oblivion and nonono, she didn't want to die here, didn't want to go this way..._

_As she drowned in her misery, a voice spoke to her._

**_"Servant. You are needed."_**

_Servant?_

**_"Humanity is threatened. You are needed."_**

_Humanity? What did humanity matter now? It was gone._

**_"Will you answer the call, Caster? Will you render aid?"_**

_What aid could someone like her possibly give? What good was she?_

_She tried to lift her head, but she was tired, oh so tired...who was Caster? Was the voice speaking to her? __Caster implied she was able to cast something. Magic. Jutsu, at the very least. No. Her only strength had been her words and her facade. Her skills with the sword-skills taught her by Naruto-were paltry by comparison. The only heroic thing she'd ever done in her life was die standing. The thought wrung a bitter chuckle from her despite her best efforts to remain silent._

Yet the voice, both a whisper in her ear and rolling thunder without, would not let her be.

**_"You stood your ground before a false god and despite your weakness, did not falter."_**

_Did that count?_

**_"You played your part true unto the end."_**

_What part? She hadn't been able to do anything._

**_"A masterful actress, only ever showing you true face to one man."_**

_One who was likely dead at that. All because of her._

**_"The world remembers, even if humanity does not."_**

_What good had her sacrifice done her?_

**_"Rise, Koyuki Kazahana."_**

_She wasn't sure she wanted to anymore._

**_"Rise,__ daughter of snow and ruler of spring."_**

_What did she want, then?_

**_"Rise and take your rightful place among legends."_**

_And then there was light._

_It burst through the shadow like a pillar of lightning, scouring all before it. Shadows fled with a hiss, and she blinked wearily, squinting helplessly against it. There. In the light she glimpsed an arm. Hers. How quaint. She gazed at her fingers in quiet consternation. She remembered loosing this arm-and the rest of herself-to that abomination. So why was it still attached? The voice came on again, then._

**_"Rise. They are waiting for you. You have but to join them."_**

_Something in her wanted that light. Longed for it._

_She reached for the light..._

* * *

_(...0o0o0...)_

* * *

_...and opened her eyes._

She sucked in a breath without thinking; because she had lungs to breathe with again, a body to feel. _Eyes from which she could see. _She was alive and moving again and that was all that mattered. She could feel warm metal beneath the soles of her shoes, the bitter chill of death blasted so suddenly as if it had never been. She could move. Think. Feel. See.

_What she saw took her breath away._

In place of the despairing dark in which she'd been swallowed, the freshly summoned Servant found herself standing in a massive sprawling chamber with a high ceiling. It looming luminescence offered a faint light for her sore and aching orbs to comprehend her new situation. Memories and information-readily supplied by the grail-thoughts not her own, all of it flooded her at once, catching the blackette off guard. On a certain lever Koyuki knew she could be frightened, but she couldn't bring herself to feel it. Or much of anything, really. And yet.

And yet...

"Oh, hello there!" a young man clad in a white uniform beamed back at her as the light faded. "You must be the new Servant. You're Caster, right?"

...yet?" she ventured hesitantly, dithering before him.

Caster took in dark hair and bright eyes, a firm-yet-youthful face that bespoke of honesty and hope. It almost reminded her of him. She saw the marks on his hand, felt the thin tether of energy binding her to him, to the facility itself, and almost smiled. Yes, he did remind of _him. _Almost as if-

With that stray thought, everything came rushing back.

She blinked rapidly.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

She didn't want to remember. Ignorance was bliss, as they say. Yet her mind betrayed her all the same and she found herself recalling her final hours. Naruto. The Beast. That foul, false creature attacking her beloved like a mad dog, watching the two of them rage across the country like a pair of demons; then that foul trick the latter used to gain the upper hand. When he hadn't been able to win alone, he'd brought an army down on her beloved's head. Even then he still might've won. She'd been a hostage. A danger. Despite all her resolve, she'd still been an unwitting handicap. Her presence had shackled him and because of her...because of her...!

She wanted to know.

She _had_ to know.

Though the words threatened to choke her, she dared to speak them.

"I...is Naruto here?"

Ritsuka Fujimaru swore softly and planted a hand against his forehead. "Oh, not again. You're the third this week. Avenger's not going to be happy."

"Avenger...?"

"Look, I'm really sorry about this." her Master sighed. "He's not in a good mood at the moment, not after last time...

Last time? Caster-Koyuki!-tilted her head. She had no idea what he meant. And who was this Avenger? Judging by the young Master's strained expression she expected an explanation of some sort. Instead the young man all but reared back and pressed a button against the wall. A soft chime rang out, capturing her attention. Then came the voice, soft and nebulous, rising through the speakers overhead.

_"Avenger, report to the summoning chamber, please."_

Oh, but she would know. Quite shortly at that.

"Alright! So who's the newbie, kiddo?!"

Caster's world shattered apart.

She knew that voice.

Not a heartbeat later, an unfamiliar presence registered in her peripherals as the door opposite the chamber whooshed open. A scraggly mane of blond hair immediately caught her gaze, but the golden eyes beneath baffled her as did the dirty rags he wore At any rate, he did not seem to notice her, much less register her presence until he drew closer. It didn't look like him. Not truly. His presence was all wrong and he had neither a gauntlet nor a sword. And yet some tiny part of her soul held onto the vain hope that it might be him.

...Naruto?" she ventured the word weakly. "Is that you?"

Golden eyes widened upon her. Narrowed.

She didn't expect his response.

"Who are you?" he frowned.

Koyuki winced.

_It hurt._

**A/N: SURPRISE.**

**Now before you protest!**

**If bloody Shakespeare, with no magic and no martial prowess whatsoever can qualify for the Caster class, so too, can Koyuki. She fits nothing else so much as this. ****We've got Mata Hari as an Assassin for crying out loud and _she_ can't even fight properly. ****But our stern snow princess casts words, not magic, not chakra, and while this iteration DOES have some semblance of sword training under her belt, she's not a combat type.**

**Really, the most she can do is inspire her allies and give them a boost...and a poignant one at that.**

**Exile!Naruto is going to be in for quite a surprise if he ever makes it to Chaldea. As things stand, this didn't mesh well with the draft I've written for the third chapter of A Most Unlikely Avenger, so in place of a chapter, this fragment was delegated here, to the collection. It DOES happen, we simply don't witness her summoning in the Avenger tale. Naturally she'll be able to tell the difference from Avenger to Exile off the bat. She's sharp like that.**

**And now she lives on in Chaldea. ****And there we have it. **

**So...in the immortal words of Atlas...**

**...Review...Would You Kindly...? **

**And enjoy a preview!**

**Someone's a softie.**

**Softie~!**

**Kudos if you get the reference.**

**Also! SPOILERS!**

**(Preview)**

_"Is this a freaking intervention?"_

_He lasted all of two seconds. And then:_

_"YOU'LL NEVER TAKE ME ALIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIVE!"_

* * *

_...big brother?"_

_"I ain't never seen you before, kid."_

_Nursery Rhyme wavered in place, eyes wide._

_Her lower lip trembled traitorously as he looked on._

_No. She wouldn't dare. __"B-B-But you promised me...you promised..._

_She was gonna. He saw the tears gather in her eyes a heartbeat too late._

_"Ack?!" Naruto swore aloud as she burst into miserable sobs. "No no no! Don't cry! I'm sorry!"_

**R&R! =D**


	8. A Most Unlikely Aberration (Fragment)

**A/N: HA! TRIPLE Update!**

**I did say we'd be focusing on Beast for a bit, did I not?**

***EDIT***

**No reviews, eh? That makes me sad...**

**So here we are, because people were wining and whinging that I hadn't done this yet. I hope I don't disappoint. **

**There, now onto the show.**

***bawls happily***

**YOU GUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUYS!**

**Oh you magnificent glorious bastards, I don't' deserve you! You're the best! You know what you did! Thank you, thank you, thank youuuuuuuuuu! I don't know what I'd do without you and your kind words; the reviews are wind beneath my wings, they are life and happiness and keep me writing. **

**So lets explain this fragment.**

**Here, Zouken made the mistake of getting involved in the events of Fate Zero. Stupid, I know. He really shouldn't have.**

**Because sometimes when you stare into the abyss, the abyss stares back.**

**Reviews are love. Reviews are life. Reviews make me strive.**

**As ever, this will be gone in **_two days_ **if folks don't like it.**

**References are glorious and I own nothing~!**

**Sorry if its short. I'm just so damn busy**

**T_T**

_"Were you dropped on your head as a child?"_

_"What?! No! Why would you say that?!"_

_"Because you're an idiot."_

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Aberration (Fragment)**

Beast opened his eyes.

On some level he was surprised to open them at all; he hadn't thought it was possible be summoned. He was a monster. An abomination. Destroyer of worlds. It shouldn't even be possible for him to _be _summoned in the form of a Servant at that, let alone beckoned into this form at all. With no class container to bind him, he would wind up as a wraith, or a classless Servant. Perhaps even Berserker on a good day. While it shouldn't be an _impossiblity, _the chances of being beckoned at all were so minute as to be nonexistent. You'd have better luck summoning Angra Mainyu himself than you would him.

So when he beheld Matou Zouken leering at him like the complete and utter idiot he was, Beast decided.

He wasn't having that shit.

"Yeah...no. Were you dropped on your head as a child?"

The old worm bristled as if he'd been slapped across the face. "What?! No! Why would you say that?!"

Hmm. That _was_ something to wonder about, he supposed. "Because you, my good man are a complete and utter _idiot."_

Before he could think to bind him, the false Servant summoned a single tail of chakra and lashed out into the pit. Scarce had he struck than the writhing worms dissolved on the spot. Zouken shouted on him-more words in an endless animal bleat that he didn't even deign to hear-and he turned a baleful red iris upon him.

"You never should've summoned me," he sneered. "I learned how to devour souls AGES ago."

Matou Zouken never saw his demise.

One moment he sneered at the Servant he'd summoned and prepared to bind him with a Command Spell; in the next, he simply ceased to exist. "Berserker" flicked a lazy wrist loosely in his direction as one would toward a particularly annoying gnat. That was all it took. A surge of red light burst from his palm and did its master's work, obliterating every trace of the old worm's soul and the hosts it tried to cling onto. Frantically, it fought to hang on, jumping from worm to worm as it fled the corrosive red light. There was nowhere for it to hide, nowhere that it wasn't hunted down and eradicated.

In the end, the hideous worm didn't even have time for a final gasp.

He simply...collapsed. Like rotten driftwood tumbling under a strong breeze.

Turning his head, Beast spat on the rapidly decaying corpse and sauntered past him.

"Aw, c'mon." he growled, glancing at a fading hand. "Already? And here I wanted to have a little fun...

He paused at the edge of the pit as a girl's whimper reached him. Red eyes widened. Narrowed. And he smiled.

"Well, well, well!"

Of course, that left the matter of the girl.

With tender care, he brushed the rotten bodies of dead insects aside. Sure enough, he found what he was looking for well within. Hmm. Seemed the old worm had one last place to hide after all. A quick tap to the girl's left lung solved that problem quite nicely and prevented any remergence by the rotten little parasite. Of course, that did nothing to heal her damaged heart. He _could _fix her of course. But did he want to? Was it even worth his time for that matter? He owed this girl nothing. No, less than nothing.

And yet...wait a minute..

Beast blinked.

Once.

Twice.

An idea piqued in the back of his mind. The girl was dying. He was fading. He needed a host...but she was in no shape to carry him.

Ah, well. He was patient. He could hid in her body and wait a few years. It wasn't like he was stealing it. Just...charging rent. Yes. That was it. She owed him a debt; that was all. He wasn't doing this out of the kindness of his heart. No. Certainly not. And if he popped up a few times and _nudged _her in a better direction...surely that wasn't his fault. No, no, no. He was doing her a favor.

With a long suffering sigh the false Berserker picked her up, slung her over his shoulder, and started walking.

"You know, you really owe for this. And I collect my debts. See you in ten years, kiddo!"

The next morning Tokiomi Tohsaka found his daughter deposited at his door.

Attached to her collar was a particularly foul letter admonishing him.

Because some things were simply unacceptable.

Even for one such as Beast.

**A/N: SURPRISE.**

**Beast got humbled; it also shows why he's such a buffoon when it comes to picking fights.**

**Again, he's not a true beast, he just thinks that he is. Poor, deluded fool...**

**Feels good to squeeze this fragment out, even if it took me more energy than I would've liked. I'm deliberately updating everything to make a point and expand the "Unlikely" universe further. This is a fragment that never quite saw the light of day, but someone we'll meet later along the line. Sorry if its short, but by all means, let me know what you think of it!**

**Reviews are love. Reviews are life. Reviews make me strive.**

**As ever, this will be gone in **_two days_ **if folks don't like it.**

**References are glorious and I own nothing~!**

**So...in the immortal words of Atlas...**

**...Review...Would You Kindly...? **

**And enjoy a preview!**

**Also! SPOILERS!**

**(Preview)**

_"A race? Against one of you? No, thank you."_

_"Aw, what's wrong? Afraid you'll lose?"_

_"I would never lose-_

_"Bwack, bwack!"_

_"ITS ON!"_

* * *

_"He's the bad guy. Why are you hanging out with him?!_

_"Eh, he's harmless like this."_

_"Pass the beer!"_

**R&R! =D**


	9. A Most Unlikely Parent

**A/N: Ahhhhhhhhh slept all day and I feel good. Now I'm working the next seven! HOWEVER! An update a day keeps the doctor away, so here we are.**

**HALP Undertale has my by the throat and won't let me gooooo~!**

**I just discovered it, needless to say and wow.**

**So many options, so may endings.**

***head spins***

**...**

**...**

**Also, h****ere.**

**Because everyone wanted to see that Alter Ego fight with Beast I mentioned awhile back and I promised it for the collection.**

**Remember, they fought while Kurama/Naruto was alive. And Beast got destroyed. It also gives us a chance to see a little bit more about Kurama's life as human.**

***EDIT***

**Now, I'm not begging for reviews here. I'm grateful for every kind word and criticism I get. I genuinely enjoy talking to people. But its when folks curse and threaten me that I begin to lose my temper. ****Anyway, I'm off to work another double. Looking forward to your reviews when I get back. ****Here. Another update. Out of spite for the trolls. Enjoy it. Have at ye.**

**Reviews are love. Reviews are life. Reviews make me strive.**

**As ever, this will be gone in _two days_ if folks don't like it.**

**References are glorious and I own nothing~!**

**Get ready to laugh your arses off.**

_"You'll have to try a little harder than that now, pup._

_No matter what you say...no matter what you do...I'll always reject that vision of yours, Beast._

_You see, with great power comes great responsibility; a responsibility that you've squandered. These people have hopes. Dreams._

_Its my duty to defend those dreams. They fill me with Determination. So step up to the plate, little man__. If its a fight you want, you'll get one._

_ Don't come crying to me when you lose, don't blame me when you die, don't whine when you fry. Lets go, kid. __Allow me to show you the error of your ways."_

_~Alter Ego (before becoming a Servant)_

**A Most Unlikely Parent**

_"Sneak attack~!"_

Kurama didn't deign to open his eyes; he already knew said attack was coming long before his would-be assailant launched it in the first place. Even with its true owner long gone-and didn't that still sting?-Naruto's body was nothing if not durable these days. He barely felt the small body land on his back at all. There was only the faintest nudge against his back; scarcely enough to shift him against the bed. With little more than a grunt, he rolled over and ignored the attack altogether. Her happy chattering however, was another matter entirely.

"Dad, Dad, Dad!" a little girl's voice plucked at his ears as much as his heartstrings. "C'mon, get up! You promised you'd teach me a new jutsu today!"

"Your daughter's awake." Tenten exhaled softly, burying her head into his shoulder.

The blond groaned into a feather pillow. "Before sunrise she's _your_ daughter."

"I'm pregnant. Again." her muffled voice rose against him. "So, _yours."_

"Hey now, you're not _that_ far along and you know it-

His wife smacked him with said pillow.

"Alright, alright, I'm awake!"

Resigning himself to rise lest he face the wrath of the woman he loved, Kurama rolled over.

"You_ promised."_

Priscilla's gem-like red eyes gazed up at him with familiar fervor he knew far too well. At ten years old she was her mother's child through and through, and also the eldest. He could see Tenten in the shape of her face and the stubborn set of her jaw-alongside a pair of whiskers adorning her cheeks-but for the life of him he couldn't understand where she'd gotten the _white hair._ His daughter had let it grow long despite his warnings; now it nearly reached her waist as she impatiently edged back on her heels and waited for him to get yp. Perhaps it was her frail constitution that led to her pale skin and paler hair; she'd always had a quiet cough that manifested whenever she over-exerted herself, but for once she seemed to be holding herself in check.

She'd even kitted herself out in attire resembling Tenten in her genin days, albeit a pale blue vest and gray slacks.

Almost made him proud, it did.

Unfortunately that pride was overshadowed by the startling urge to glomm his eldest in a crushing bear hug. Too good. Too pure. He wanted to squeeze her; because baby girl was growing up. With this kind of enthusiasm he might actually consider letting her become his successor sometime down the road. The village could always use a strong Hokage, and if his eldest had even a fourth of his own potential, she was going to be an outright monster when she came of age.

But that was neither here nor there.

"Where's the rest of your siblings?" he asked, stifling a yawn with the back of a hand.

Her sheepish grin flashed out at him as he gazed at her. "Yukiko and the others are still sleeping."

A blond brow rose, mildly bemused by her childish enthusiasm. "I'm sure they are. The sun probably isn't even up yet."

Her cheeks burned rosy, but she didn't budge. Good girl. Stubborn, but good. She wouldn't move unless he made her, not something he was prepared to do.

"Alright, just give me a second...

With a jaw-popping yawn, the blond climbed out of bed and began the laborious process of waking up. Quick as a flash he'd gotten himself dressed-behind a screen to avoid scarring his young daughter-and emerged in his customary attire. Not a heartbeat-and one kiss from a sleepy Tenten-later and they were well on their way out the door. He'd been right; the sleepy sun was only just now beginning to peek a sliver of its head above the horizon; it didn't seem to be in any particular hurry to rise at that.

The village itself was another matter.

Shinobi kept all manner of odd hours; thus he wasn't at all surprised to see some of the more eccentric sorts roaming about. That dust plume couldn't be anything other Lee and his son running laps around the perimeter again. There was Neji with his twin girls perusing a weapon's shop. Seeing them, the jonin granted him a small nod. Good man, Neji. He'd come a long way since their last fight. Of course, now that he had a family to see after, all the better.

Though he moved at a sedate-for him-pace, Priscilla matched him easily. It surprised him.

So he ran faster.

Still, she nearly kept up.

Cheeky little kid did him proud.

Once upon a time he'd been able to outrun everyone. Before he'd settled down. Before he'd gotten attached. Before his golden hair started to turn silver. Old age truly was creeping up on him. Slowly, inexorably, but all the same it was _there._ Each year took a little more from him. His body might be able to endure grievous wounds, recover from anything short of death, but not time. Time was the great enemy that no one could defeat, neither man, nor beast. Time took its toll from him in small ways, tiny ways, so slightly as nearly not to be noticed. He wouldn't be around forever. He knew that.

Well! All the more reason to prepare the next generation, then.

He took her to the old training ground, the one where everything had first begun so long ago.

Gods this place brought back memories. Of who he was. What he'd been. What they had become. The boy had slipped away from the foundation and come here, sometimes. They talked often here. He'd wanted to return here, before he'd died. He _should _have been here; not an operative in Danzo's root. Not a broken husk, not a tortured soul, not DEAD-

"Papa?"

Kurama blinked, tearing himself out of the past and back to the present.

"Its nothing, then." he began, turning to face his daughter, "Remind me. What have you learned so far? That includes the Academy."

She stood at attention and began slowly counting off her fingers. "The basic clone jutsu, replacement, tree walking, water walking, a minor genjutsu, and two earth jutsu."

Kurama blinked. "Well, that's a start-

"Oh!" Priscilla perked up. "Uncle Kakashi taught me the Chidori, too!"

A muscle jumped in the blond's jaw. Did he now? He'd be having words with him.

"Lets start with Shadow Clones, then." Her delighted squeal actually made him blink; he hadn't thought anyone capable of getting to that level of pitch. "They're a useful tool, and you seem to have the chakra reserves for them." when her head bobbed in frantic agreement, he laughed. "Once you master that, I teach you the Rasengan, if you'd like. No child of mine's going to be taking missions without knowing how to defend themselves."

Gods, the girl had a pair of lungs!

"Yesyesyes!" Priscilla all but skipped from one foot to the other. "You're the best!"

They spent the better part of a day going over that jutsu; the sun was hanging low in the sky by the time she managed to pull it off without a hitch. Priscilla's reserves were certainly large enough for the task-as one might expect of an Uzumaki, but she was still young. Creating one clone wasn't enough, she wanted to be able to make hundreds. In the blink of an eye. Without seals. Cute. For someone who could easily create _thousands _on a good day, Kurama found himself almost amused by her efforts. Of course, now that he'd taught her this, he knew rest of his brood would want to learn it as well and_ didn't that just bugger all..._

A strange scent reached him all at once, wafting in on the breeze.

**"Well, well, well."** a rusty chuckle reverberated through the clearing. **"Isn't this just touching."**

Kurama paused.

The stranger didn't so much arrive as he did appear; simply stepping out of the trees themselves. Clad in little more than old furs, he looked like a hunter...but there was something wrong about him. Not only his presence but the very air itself; everything seemed to darken around him, the green-grass turned pale and dead, the once cheery sky slowly staining itself a ghastly red. Something deep inside of him recoiled at the sight of it, yet a tiny part of him recognized the face staring at him. Beast. A name popped into his head unbidden and he frowned at it. No. Not a beast. He'd seen one, once. Far, far from here. This was a fake. An impostor. Something to be shunned and scorned, yes, but also destroyed.

"Dad?" Priscilla shrank back behind him. "Who is that? Why does he look like you?"

At first Kurama froze.

He almost dared to _hope._

But no, he knew the truth, saw the lie.

Growling, the blond fixed him with a gimlet eye.

The stranger opened his mouth to speak, but he would have none of it.

"No." he held up a hand to forestall any such speech. "I don't care what you are, and I don't care what else you're going to say. I've already made up my mind." a low snarl fled from his lips. "You are a liar. A deceiver. A fake. An impostor. You're _not_ Naruto, and the fact that you wear his face despite what you've become offends me. I barely even known you and I'm already sick of you. Yet you _dare _stand before me with that visage?!" a touch of crimson chakra bubbled up around his shoulders. "Leave. Now."

Affronted by his remark, the stranger merely sniffed. **"I think...not."**

His hackles rose. "You do not want this fight."

**"Ohhhhh, I think I do."**

Kurama exhaled. "Priscilla, sweetheart. Go find your mother."

In one smooth movement hr slapped a hand against his daughters shoulder and she vanished, even as his right boot stomped against the ground.

A wall of earthen spikes shot up and skewered Beast before he could take so much as a single step forward. It was a very impressive jutsu all things considered; no seals involved, nothing beyond a chakra pulse and all of the world bent to his will. Ten dozen vicious stakes _erupted _from the soil, ripping him from his feet to hurl him into the air like a doll made of straw.

And the illusion broke.

He wasn't at all dismayed when "Naruto" turned out to be little more than an illusions; a facade formed by willpower and nothing else. When he found himself facing a monster out of his worst nightmare, a creature that'd send even the Ten-Tails itself screaming into the void. Yet he didn't falter. Even as he watched that towering scaled bulk tear itself from the spikes, he felt no fear. A retaliatory swipe blasted off half his face and caused a brief grimace of annoyance to flash across what remained. And then it grew back. Just like that.

...if its any consolation? That hurt like hell."

Beast balked, eyes bulging madly.

**"How in the hell...?**

"You don't get it, do you?" The entity snarled, exposing sharpened canine teeth. "Get it through that thick skull of yours. I'm not Naruto. Nor am I Kurama either. I'm both. They are me. I am them. We are one. I only call myself Kurama because it feels right; because the name brings me some semblance of comfort of who I once was. This my world, boy." a lone hand rose to cradle a cruel current of wind in its grasp. "I rule here. I am your judge. I am your jury. I am your executioner. I yield to no one save time. Now then, you ugly little shit...

He grinned.

_"Get off my lawn."_

And the world twisted.

Beast barely had time to blink before the familiar trees of the Leaf fell away, replaced by unforgiving stone and an unfamiliar rush of water.

"Ah, the Valley of the End!" Kurama threw his arms wide, as though to embrace the statues above. "Good times, good times. I have some fond memories of this place. Seems fitting for your demise."

**"When did you...?!"**

"Did you really think I was going to let you fight on my doorstep? Endanger _my_ village?" Kurama quirked an eyebrow as the air grew dark around them. "I've had this little trap in place for years now, just in case any of my old enemies decided to come knocking. Hiraishin is a nasty piece of work, but its quite useful once you've learned the ins and outs of its intricacies."

With a roar, Beast flew at him.

Kurama didn't even deign to run; he simply planted his feet and swayed out of the way of that massive paw. Taut fingers flicked outward and that same arm collapsed at the elbow, spouting gore. He could've assumed his true form and grappled with this abomination, but he saw no need. No, he'd much rather address this...personally. It he turned into _that _again, he risked losing himself.

Besides.

This was _fun._

Clenched knuckles rocketed up into Beast's jaw, strong fingers wrapping around its teeth before it could bite down. Towering teeth closed down around him and found themselves subsequently stalled. Instead of advancing the giant found itself inexplicably caught, its advance ground to halt by raw power and the determination lurking behind it. A looming red iris swiveled down at him, widening incomprehensibly large. Kurama cracked a tiny grin as the muscles in his shoulders tensed. Still gripping the creature's face, those golden slits still gazing calmly up at him, he spun...

"ORAH!"

...then he tossed him.

T'was a simple judo throw, nothing more; yet in that instant Kurama heaved the creature over his shoulder as though it weighed no more than a heavy sack of grain. With a startled squawk Beast went flying, tumbling end over endless end before crashing headlong into the lake, body thrashing mightily underwater. He burst out just as quickly, but a faint, distant pressure registered against his skull. In a rare moment of fear, he looked up.

Kurama waved back at him.

"You'll have to try a little harder than that now, pup."

A vicious one-two chop to the throat left his foe gasping for air.

"No matter what you say...no matter what you do...I'll always reject that vision of yours, Beast."

Slapping a clawed paw aside, he spun and drove an elbow through his armored side.

"You see, with great power comes great responsibility; a responsibility that you've squandered. These people have hopes. Dreams."

Sweeping the larger man's legs, he uprooted him and smashed an ax kick into the center of his chest.

"Its my duty to defend those dreams. They fill me with Determination. So step up to the plate, little man. If its a fight you want, you'll get one."

The moment Beast tried to rise he found a Rasengan lodged into his stomach; grinding him down into the earth.

"I warned, you didn't I?" Kurama's urbane hum drew a snarl from his prey as he climbed back out of the crater. "I gave you a chance to run. I told you. don't come crying to me if you lose, don't blame me when you die, don't whine if you fry." he fell back in a loose stance, four fingers crooking towards himself in a come-hither motion. "So lets go, kid. Allow me to show you the error of your ways."

To his credit, his foe almost resisted the taunt.

Almost.

Then they lunged.

Just as planned; Kurama took three more limbs, followed by a contemptuous back-fist sent them sprawling. When they regenerated and Beast lunged again, he supplexed them into the water where they belonged.

**"ENOUGH!"**

The hybrid calmly flicked a sealing array between him as the abomination tore itself out of the water; but an attack never came. A swell of darkness burst from the Beast-false!-but rather than scorch his skin, it washed over him harmlessly. He shook his shoulders like a wet dog, shaking off the last of the taint, and stood tall.

It came as something of a surprise to find himself staring at seven corrupted heroes.

**"You know nothing about Servants!"** the creature was frothing furious now, foam flecking at its lips as it dropped down to all fours. **"Nothing about my army! I've corrupted legends! Conquered kings! Do you hear me?! I'LL CRUSH YOU!"**

"Mindless puppets, really? You call that an army? How quaint. "You call yourself god?" Kurama permitted himself a small smile. "You're going to be _less_ than that when I'm done with you. I can do this all day."

**"Oh, yeah?" **came the snarl. **"You and what army? I see only one of you."**

"Seriously? Have you forgotten our favorite jutsu? Really?

Kurama laughed, a loud, deep, delighted guffaw.

...he really shouldn'ta pressed that button.

"What army, you say? That's easy."

Then flexed his fingers.

"Mine."

With a single plume of smoke, he had an army of his own. A thousand scowling clones, each brimming with red chakra, each as angry as the original and nearly as solid. Nothing short of three blows would disperse them, and unlike Beast's pale ghosts, each held themselves capable of independent action and thought. They knew how to act as a unit. They had discipline. Cohesion. Nothing like the mindless rabble surging at them. They saw the threat before them, and each were of one mind on the matter.

"Gentlemen!"

Kurama raised a hand.

"Present arms! Take aim!"

Each of the clones mirrored him.

Beast bristled. _'I think...I've blundered.'_

A high, keening shriek built and swelled in the air.

Fist a dozen. Then a hundred. More. And more. More still.

The furious buzz of a thousand Rasenshuriken filled the ground as one.

When Kurama flicked his hand forward, so too did his clones, all in an instant.

Beast didn't have time to curse them, or to snarl, or even give another grand speech.

He was far, far, FAR too preoccupied with screaming his throat raw as the vortex swallowed him whole.

**A/N: There we go.**

**It felt...right to go back to the past like that.**

**Maybe I'll make it a thing here in the collection if you guys like it?**

**Lion King references are obvious and I don't own jack.**

**That's the last we'll see of Beast for awhile; remember, he's not the true villain. There's another force at work here. And yes, you're going to get the second half of that Servant Baseball Game quite soon, if I have anything to say about it. ****So by all means, talk to me. Tell me what you want to see. I like talking to you guys. It makes me feel like I'm making a difference in people's lives, you know?**

**Reviews are love. Reviews are life. Reviews make me strive. Without reviews, well, I simply wouldn't feel alive.**

**As ever, this will be gone in **_two days_ **if folks don't like it. ****References are glorious and I own nothing~!**

**So...in the immortal words of Atlas.****..Review...Would You Kindly...? **

**And enjoy these preview! ****Here be a surprise:**

**Because someone asked. And, well...**

**...I like doing requests.**

**(Preview)**

_"And who are you, kiddo?"_

_The young man-Naruto?-beamed right back._

_ "Explorer! Say, you haven't seen Anne or Mary around, have ya?"_

_Despite himself, he almost smiled. There was just something familiar about him. "Who?"_

_"They're my partners in crime, you see. Well, we're going to steal some shit." his grin was almost infectious. "Its what pirates do."_

**R&R! =D**


	10. A Most Unlikely Brawler

**A/N: *EDIT***

**Behold the trolls in the reviews. Now you see what I'm dealing with. So sick of this...**

** Double update day.**

**Whoo. Sorry, I'm just a tad upset.**

**No one's been reviewing much of anything of late, bar flamers.**

**I'm not moderating them anymore, and I'm not taking them down. **

**I guess you could say that I'm a mite bit annoyed.**

**So here. Just a bit for the collection:**

**This is a fragment that the trolls killed before I could even write it, so it found its way here. So here. Brawler!Naruto. No special powers. Fists only. I might put Explorer story here in the collection-NO DORA jokes, please-as well, given that everyone seems to be tired of Fate. This is what I get for trying to keep the daily updates flowing, I suppose. Hmm. The best way to describe this Naruto's strength in three words...?**

**One. Punch. Man.**

**So here. A class that I made, but one that never got a story for itself. So...here...**

**I'm going to update some non-fate stories now, seeing as people keep railing on me relentlessly.**

**Now, onward!**

_"Will you shut up about YOUTH already?!_

_There's nothing useful about this! Nothing! At all!_

_I need these skills to survive! To LIVE! So teach me, damnit!"_

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Brawler**

_I liked to fight._

_That's the long and short of it._

_Some say it came naturally to me. It didn't._

_It just...came. I happened to be good at cracking skulls._

_I didn't have any choice, you see. In this world its kill or be killed._

_I learned that lesson the hard way; when I was five I beat a boy half to death. He thought it would be fun to to gang up on me with his friends. To laughed at me for having no parents. When I was seven his father tried to kill me, so I broke their nose. When I was ten, someone tried to slip into my apartment and knife me in the dead of night. I broke their neck. By the time I was eleven, I excelled as physical combat. It was rough, it was crude, but I didn't care. At thirteen, I beat the Sasuke into the ground. It was the one thing nobody could take away from me. I was good at fighting. _

_They didn't want me to graduate because I hurt their precious Uchiha? That's fine. I didn't care._

_I turned right around and found the best unarmed fighter I could._

_His name was Might Guy._

_Don't look at me like that. I was never his student. Not really. Not in the traditional sense of the word. I never wore that hideous green spandex. I never became quite as loud or as exuberant as he and Lee were. I just couldn't be. I didn't try to emulate him. I never understood his obsession with "youthfulness" but damn if I didn't learn a few things from him. I discovered that I'd gained an absurd healing factor. That I could train as hard as I wanted and be fit to fight again in less than an hour. That there really wasn't an upper "limit" on my physical strength. It just...kept shooting up._

_And up._

_Up._

_Team Seven went on their little bridge mission. They lost a teammate. I didn't care. Team Seven entered the Chunin Exams. Sasuke died. I didn't care. The world kept spinning, and I kept training. One day I flattened Neji with a single punch; I'll never forget the gobsmacked look on his face. Or the kiss Tenten gave me for that. Worth. It. You don't nearly kill your cousin and act like its fate. I kept knocking that smug little prick down until I finally knocked some sense **into** him._

_You see, Gai had taught me something; t__o be true to myself._

_By the time that I learned the secret of the eight gates on my own-because he simply refused to teach me it-I began to realize that I didn't want to become Hokage anymore. Pranks were all well and good, but I saw the way the village looked at me. I didn't much care for it; not when I had the strength to flatten most of them with a single punch. They could keep me in the genin corps all they liked, but they couldn't keep me from trying to train, to fight, to get stronger. I trained until my hair fell out, until I achieved an impossible power. Strength doesn't just come from your fists. It comes from Determination._

_When the village was invaded during the finals, I somehow found myself roped into it. More my fault for wanting to watch the fights._

_I should've kept my nose out of it, but I couldn't help myself._

_Orochimaru's barrier popped like a soap bubble._

_The snake didn't last much longer._

_Credit where it was due, it took TWO punches to beat Gaara. One for him, and one for Shukaku. Its a bit of a miracle that the former lived. Shame about his demon, though. By then, I was almost annoyed. Fighting wasn't fun anymore. Not when I could level anything with one punch. Where was the challenge? Where was the excitement? I tried sealing my strength, but that didn't work, either. The power I had acquired wasn't chakra based or energy related, but pure, physical strength._

_When the Hokage offered me a headband and asked me to become a proper ninja?_

_I thought about. I really did._

_BUT I REFUSED._

_No, by then I didn't want to go on missions. I spat at the idea. They'd already failed me how many times, and now they wanted me because I was strong? Because I'd saved them from Gaara and Orochimaru? Ha! I knew the goodwill wouldn't last. It never does. So I packed my things, said my goodbyes to everyone and left. Not for power, not for strength, but for excitement. I wanted to fight strong opponents. Somewhere along the line, I realized fighting had become a passion of mine, a goal, something by which to measure myself. So I sought strong opponents and __never looked back. It wasn't as if they could stop me._

_So come on._

_Lets go. Put up your dukes._

_"You're about to have a bad time, bub."_

**A/N: And there we have it.**

**Gods, I'm so tired of getting lambasted for this.**

**Other stories are coming along nicely, A Most Unlikely Berserker included.**

**But as for me...I think I'm going to take a break. Its clear that folks don't like Fate stuff anymore.**

**Reviews are love. Reviews are life. Reviews keep me alive.**

**Despite the trolls and flamers harassing me.**

**So in the Immortal Words of Atlas...**

**...Review, Would You Kindly?**

**NO. MORE. PREVIEWS.**

**Sorry.**

**R&R! =D**


	11. A Most Unlikely Explorer

**A/N: Suspend your disbelief and get ready to smile.**

**You can think of this Naruto as a contrast to Card!Naruto, because he lives life purely for the thrill of it.**

**And the daily updates role on!**

**Here we are, another bit for the collection!**

**So lets clarify a few things.**

**In A Most Unlikely Drifter I mentioned that a few Alternate!Naruto's would show up, right? Allow me to list two of them.**

_**Brawler!Naruto.**_

_**Explorer!Naruto.**_

**I'll list the others later.**

**Still, these two have been revealed in this Collection. ****So here's the latter's backstory.**

**Despite this persnickety illness, I'm in a pretty good mood considering FGO's been good to me.**

**On my second day playing the game I wound up getting Mozart, Hassan of the Cursed Arm, Saint George, Kotaro, Sasaki, and Mata Hari.**

**Then, on my last two summonings of the night, one I did purely on a whim...**

**...I got Nero Claudius and Kiyohime.**

**0_0**

**Well!**

**If I wasn't addicted to this game before, I am now. I wasn't even trying to get her! I didn't even know that was possible! I haven't spent a single CENT on this game and by some blind bloody struck of luck I keep getting good luck! I swear to god if I keep getting good fortune like this I'm going to lose my mind! I usually don't play mobile games at all, yet this one's caught my eye.**

**As of now, I've just cleared the Fuyuki Singularity.**

**So I'm sorry if this introduction is short.**

**But I'm off to work again.**

**Hope ya enjoy~!**

_"Prepare to be boarded!_

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Explorer**

_Men rely on tools._

_Its simply what we do._

_It is our nature, you see._

_From one thing to another; first came fire, then stone. Iron. Steel. We learned to invent, to create, to make what we did not have. What we could not surpass with simple brute strength we soon sought to outwit. What we cannot understand, we instead seek to destroy. Pitiful, isn't it? I think we care too much. That's the problem with mankind, I've found. We ask so many questions and when we don't like the answers, or a bit of knowledge that we regard as "unsightly" we toss them aside as if they were trash._

_Yet we hunt, we seek, we search for answers. We explore._

_Me?_

_I'm not much for fighting._

_Ah, but treasure! Thar be a different story. Taking! Stealing! Raiding! That's where the action is._

_Life's so much better when you just stop caring about others, don'tcha think? Its certainly better for me, at any rate. I learned that lesson when I turned twelve._

_Hokage? Shinobi? Bah!_

_Give me the wind in my sails and the salty spray of the sea on my face any-day. Simpler that way._

_And all this came about from me blundering with the Scroll of Sealing. What?! I thought it was a test! Nobody told me there was a person living inside the damn thing! Well, two people, but still! How was I to know what I would find in there?! In recompense for my temerity I got knocked right on my ass and had a pistol to my head in a minute. They asked who I was, how I'd released them, what I wanted._

_Their names were Anne Bonney and Mary Read. _

_Servants, legendary beings who were both brought into this world and summarily sealed away by the Fourth Hokage. How do you trap a living person in a scroll, I wonder? How does that even work? Does time just...stop for them inside there?_

_Regardless, in freeing them, I became bound to them._

_Or perhaps they were bound to me?_

_Was it the other way around?_

_Meh, semantics._

_Never quite understood the concept of that. __But they couldn't stay in this world without me there to anchor them. The moment I "released" them they began to fade away within minutes. Without an anchor they were little more than an old wreck of a ship, drifting on the tides. Lost. Adrift. They needed someone to stabilize them._

_So I did._

_Why?_

_Because they were the first to talk to me, really talk to me as if I were somebody.__They named me their first mate. __As if that was something to be proud of. We didn't even have a ship back then. I was little more than an idiot kid; one who barely knew his way around his first shadow clone jutsu._

_Yet when Mizuki came waltzing in?_

_Hehehe. __He had a bad time._

_A demon, am I?_

_Well! This demon killed the mouthy-chunin who tricked him, __took the Scroll of Sealing, left the village and never looked back. Ha! Did you really think I would return something that valuable! No! Never! The secrets locked away inside this thing made me a force to be feared; because I learned every one of them. I discovered the truth of what "Servants" where and what "mages" used to be. It was only a matter of time before I learned just where they came from. Anne and Mary called it the Throne as best they could. After that? We just had to break reality. So I did._

_I explored the countryside with them gathered up my brothers and sister jinchuuriki, stole them away from each of their villages, and convinced them to join me. Oh, the stories I could tell! The years that went by! It was glorious! We made our way to Wave, took apart a nasty old businessman calling himself Gatou, and stole a ship._

_Together at sea, we joined forces._

_We pooled our powers._

_And then reality._

_Juuuuust._

_Broke._

_Only for a moment, but it was enough. I felt it. I saw it. I managed to touch the "Root" without being drawn in and was changed for it. So much energy. So much...information. Knowledge. Power, the likes of which I can't even begin to describe in this diary. I could tell you exactly how many versions of myself exist in the multiverse. I could tell you the name of the True Threat...but I won't. I sealed all that knowledge off and locked it away, keeping only what I needed. Even then_

_Now? The world was never the same._

_We took more ships, built what we didn't have._

_Mist learned that the hard way. We sacked them and took all they had._

_Then we decided the sea wasn't enough and went inland. We were explorers and thieves to be sure, but we wanted adventure. Excitement! Glory!_

_Once you understand the theory behind it, its easy to summon a Servant. If you've got an abundance of energy? All the more. Now, most shinobi have a fixed amount of chakra. Sure, you can increase your reserves, but once your reach a certain point? That's it. __Jinchuuriki have all their chakra, in addition to those of their...guests._

_Of course, once I learned how to do it, I had to teach others. Fair share in the crew and what not._

_Now tell me, what happens when __Nine jinchuuriki share their powers? Ohohoho. That's a lot of energy for a lot of Servants._

_We drowned the Akatsuki in sheer numbers and every threat that came after them. I still stayed with my girls. Didn't have eyes for anyone but them. Even figured out how to reincarnate them as human beings with all of their power intact. Sure their were some hiccups along the way, some rebellions, a bunch of stray enemies to put down, but in the end? Our merry little band-quite large now-ruled through sheer strength of arms. Anyone who stepped out of line or tried a coup'detat-looking at you, Mephistopheles!-was swiftly put down._

_When you can give a Servant a second life and all they've ever wanted, they're pretty damn loyal to you._

_Now I've got a whole fleet of powerhouses sailing under my command. Life is good._

_I don't like to fight, but I will._

_Eh? What's that? I'm a faker? Not the real Naruto? Just a scoundrel who got lucky? Yup. You figured it out. I'm just a branch, one of many paths Fate could take. Think of me as a conduit. A terminal. I am, and both and am not, Naruto Uzumaki. I tip my hat to you. But this "Faker" aims to have the time of his life. I've got all I need here; me ship, me crew, me girls, and a horde of treasure that would make even Fafnir the dragon turn green with envy. I'm the scourge of land and sea alike, a wastrel with no regard for his own life save to live it for as long as I can. __But life grows boring when you've raided and ruled everything from the land to the sea._

_Eh? What's this, now? An invitation? challenge you say? A gathering of True Heroes? Hmm?!_

_..._

_..._

_..._

_...why the hell not? Not like I'm getting any younger! Draw your cutlasses and drink up, me hearties~!_

_Emiya, my boy! We'll be needing an extra large breakfast for everyone this morning~!_

_Karna! Go find your brother. If he isn't still brooding, put the slacker to work~!_

_Bee, check n' see if Fu's still hungover. We're going to need a gust~!_

_Blackbeard! Get my coat! Drake! Turn the fleet about~!_

_Somebody pry Cu and Fergus out of their tankards~! _

_Anne! Mary! Take the wheel and set a heading~!_

_Alright lads! Lets all raise a glass~!_

_Its time for another party~!_

**A/N: Clarification!**

**Explorer!Naruto answers the summons while alive.**

**ALIVE. Think of that for a moment. And he doesn't arrive alone.**

**That's all I'm going to say. *Grins madly* Make of that what you will.**

**Well, I'm off to work again, expect an update for "A Most Unlikely Hero" sometime tomorrow.**

**And there we have it.**

**The other contestants might well surprise you.**

**Sorry, not feeling very well at the moment, think I've come down with something.**

**So In the Immortal Words of Atlas...Review Would You Kindly? Every word helps. Even a single word like "nice" means the world to me.**

**Sorry, no previews this time around. As I said before, I'm sick, and any that I do have would give away some CRUCIAL plot details that are coming.**

**Until tomorrow, then~!**

**~Nz.**


	12. A Most Unlikely Joke

**A/N: *EDIT***

**If you get Saw vibes from this...well. That's intentional.**

**Suspend your disbelief and get ready to smile.**

**And the daily updates role on!**

**Here we are, another bit for the collection!**

**So lets clarify a few things.**

**In A Most Unlikely Drifter I mentioned that a few Alternate!Naruto's would show up, right? Allow me to list some of them.**

_**Brawler!Naruto.**_

_**Explorer!Naruto.**_

_**Trapper!Naruto.**_

_**Healer!Naruko.**_

**Still, these four have been revealed in this Collection. ****So here's the latter's backstory.**

**Also, a warning for FGO players. Nerofest isn't working properly. As in, its crashing phones. More aptly, its the finals. I have an up-to-date Iphone and decent internet, but a lot of the "Fatal Battles" aren't loading properly. No idea what the cause is, just a warning. To date, it still won't work. I know for a fact that I'm not the only one having an issue and I've been talking with others about it. No idea as to the cause, but there you are.**

**Speaking of which, I just got another four star in the form Saber!Lancelot! Didn't even know he was a thing. Apparently he's a really good Servant? I've also looked at the odds for summoning some of the Five-Stars and they are...concerning. Not even a single percent chance for some of them? Well. Time to put me luck to the test. I've also received Medusa, Billy the Kid, Diarmuid, Caesar-getting WAY too many of him!-and two more Neros. Seriously! I'm not even trying to get her! She just keeps showing up!**

**0_0**

**Which is nice, because thanks to each of them, Nero's Noble Phantasm now hits like a truck. One more now and I'll be able to max it out~! I'm onto the second singularity now, and still silently hoping for Saber Alter. Yeesh, if this keeps up, I'm going to have most of the Four Stars before we get that free four star ticket.**

**When IS that, anyway? Anybody know? Anybody at all?**

***EDIT***

**So I'm sorry if this introduction is short.**

**But I'm off to work again.**

**Hope ya enjoy~!**

_"Can't. You. Just. Play. ALONG?!"_

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Game**

_Life's a game._

_Wouldn't you say?_

_We all laugh and live and play._

_Each of us-each and every one of us!-go through the motions that we call life. We eat. We sleep. We work. Rinse and repeat. Little pockets of monotony broken up by random events, brief starbursts of joy and happiness that fade just as quickly as they came. Because life's a game. And we all want to win. Don't we? You don't play a game to lose. Civilian, criminal or shinobi, we all play to win. The losers die, the winners live to fight again, be it in the streets or the alleys or even the sheets. That's what it means to play the game called life?_

_But what happens when you don't get what you want?_

_What happens when you lose?_

_When you fail?_

_Tell me, what happens when you kick a dog one too many times? It turns mean, of course. Even the most loyal mutt will eventually snap and snarl at all those who come near it, fearing that they'll be hurt again. Just as we have light in us, so too do we hold and hide our own little pockets of darkness. It can happen to anyone, really. One bad day. One poor decision leads to another and another STILL; a spiraling pattern that you're not quite aware of. But by the time you realize what you've done, what you've become, its too late to stop._

_It happened to me early in my life, a simple and devastating change._

_You see, everyone was always glaring at me. Whispering behind my back. In another world, I'd been naively blind to it all. But in this one? I noticed. I actually asked them to stop. They pelted me with stones. I cried. They laughed at me. I tried to make them notice me by acting out through pranks and other mischief. Their scorn only grew deeper with every year. _

_"You'll never amount to anything." __They all said those words to me time and again_

_I ignored them for so very long; I thought I would prove them wrong. And one day... I...well...I just..._

_...I had a horrible thought. __What if they were right about me? What if I was fooling myself? Was it all just a trick? A joke?_

_They failed me out of the Academy four times; funny thing, it was always the laughter that stuck with me. Those mocking jeers...those snickers..._

_It wasn't funny._

_They stepped on me one too many times. Kicked me when I was down until finally, FINALLY something broke. My pranks were harmless for years. Everyone always underestimated them, and by definition, me. Yes, they were harmless. Until quite suddenly they weren't. You'd be surprised what happens when you mix certain chemicals together. Have you seen what acid paint can do to stone? No? How about skin? Those Anbu never did recover. Wire traps are a nasty piece of business by themselves; pair the bastards with one or two kunai and a few explosive tags and you'd be downright amazed what they can do._

_Everyone wanted to blame the demon brat, but they never found proof. I covered my tracks._

_Eventually it became obvious I couldn't keep doing this-least of all when a certain Uchiha was killed by one of my traps-so the village had to go. Rather, I did. Mizuki simply gave me the excuse. Steal the Scroll of Sealing and learn a jutsu from it? Bah. As if that would let me achieve my ambition. Life's a game, you see. And I play to win. That night I stole the Leaf's greatest secrets and left him holding the bag. Shadow Clones are a sight useful if you're clever. While they held a public execution for poor, poor Mizuki and "Naruto", I had already away to join the first hidden village that would take me. _

_Onoki proved rather...accommodating in the coming years, until Akatsuki came calling._

_When they tried to rip that damn fox out of me? I SURVIVED. Through sheer bloody force of will. Instead of draining me, I drained their statue. It left me with nine individual voices in my head, nine beasts of chakra who refused to become the Ten-Tails. Nine minds who were of one accord regarding the Moon's Eye Plan. Nine. Angry. Tailed. Beasts. That was alright. I was angry too. So I let them put myself back together, sat up, and blew Tobi's precious hideout to kingdom come. I think he was__ too stunned to stop me._

_Still, that left me with a world's worth and power and nothing to do._

_After that, I kept making my traps, games, puzzles. Deadly gauntlets that I ran my people through for kicks. Some survived. Some didn't._

_Sick? _

_Twisted?_

_Deranged__, you say?_

_Probably._

_I'm just a dog chasing cars. I wouldn't know what to do if I caught one; much less if someone survived one my puzzles. When two kids actually did? I adopted them and taught that boy and girl everything I knew. I was nothing it not fair. If you survived, you earned a second chance. If not. Well. Really, its almost funny. They say villains never prosper. But I don't consider myself a villain. I'm just someone who likes to gamble. To play games. Roll the dice. Can't you just play along? It'd be so much easier for all of us if you did._

_Life's just a bad joke, really. We're all just waiting for the punchline._

_Eh? What's this? __An invitation, now? _

_Hmm. Sure. Why the hell not?_

_I want to play a game._

**A/N: Clarification!**

**This is not a Joker!Naruto. No makeup, no face paint, no green hair. Its one who simply lived life the way he pleased and paid the price for it. He's not the true villain, but he IS a bad guy. One of the few that haven't been hunted down and put to the sword by Snatcher!Naruto and the rest**

**He. Is. Not. Sane.**

**He thinks of life as a game, one without consequences.**

**Well, I'm off to work again, expect an update for "A Most Unlikely Saber" and "A Most Unlikely Berserker" as well as "Moon Cancer" and "Saver sometime soon.**

**And there we have it.**

**The other contestants might well surprise you.**

**Sorry, not feeling very well at the moment, think I've come down with something.**

**So In the Immortal Words of Atlas...Review Would You Kindly? Every word helps. Even a single word like "nice" means the world to me.**

**Sorry, no previews this time around. As I said before, I'm sick, and any that I do have would give away some CRUCIAL plot details that are coming.**

**Until tomorrow, then~!**

**~Nz.**


	13. A Most Unlikely Detective

**A/N: Hope you enjoy this fragment!**

**Don't really have much else to say, I've got work today.**

**Reviews are love, reviews are life, reviews keep me alive despite all else.**

**This is just a fragment, hopefully I can expand more on it later. If folks like this, great. If not, it'll vanish. So do let me know!**

_"Elementary, my dear!"_

_"That is NOT going to be you catchphrase."_

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Detective**

_Life is a mystery._

_Throughout history we have always pondered the great truths of existence, of crime, of what the world is. Why are we here? Why are we alive? Why do good men do bad things? Why do bad men do goo things? Why? That IS the question now, isn't? __I don't know when I took an interest in such things; perhaps it was the praise, the accolades that came with solving crimes. Who knew? Turns out I actually had the mind for it, once I learned to focus. To concentrate. So what if I was dead last in school? Failure only made my inevitable success all the more heady._

_I like solving crimes. I LIKE catching villains. I LOVE puzzling out a mystery until it__ became addicting all the same._

_Consider this, for a moment._

_Where did we all come from? How did this begin?_

_Who is the Prime!Naruto? From whence did all these Servants spawn? There has to be an answer. I just know it. Across time, across the multiverse, somewhere. Somewhen. Somehow. The answer is out there. Waiting to be found. And I'll be the one to find it. But I can't solve this mystery alone. That wouldn't work. I'll need...help. Assistance. Magical or otherwise. I'll leave my assistant to watch the shop for a bit._

_For if life is a mystery, then I must surely solve it._

_Very well! I think I'll accept this challenge._

_I'll fight in this faker's so-called war._

_Solve its mysteries and more._

_Its what I stand for._

**A/N: There we go!**

**Again, just a fragment, let me know what you think in your reviews!**

**So...in the immortal words of Atlas...**

**...Review...Would You Kindly...? **


	14. A Most Unlikely Glimpse

**A/N: Here.**

**Because everyone was clamoring for it after I updated Jester, and Berserker and Lancer aren't quite ready yet.**

**As per the title is brief glimpse, a preview of THE TRUE VILLAIN the one who's silently been orchestrating everything in the Unlikely series; an individual who reared their head in A Most Unlikely Jester. To clarify, he's the bastard pulling the strings, orchestrating the events that gave rise to each and every Servant!Naruto as well as every Master!Naruto we've seen thus far.**

**Have a little glimpse of him, before he gets his debut in his own story.**

**His arrival is...well. Lets just say that its imminent. He'll appear again in A Most Unlikely Shielder.**

**Unlike Beast, he's frightfully sane.**

**As to his motives...you'll see.**

***EDIT***

**Everybody enjoying the FGO Halloween event? I certainly am!**

**Sadly, I couldn't afford to wait anymore with the 25th rapidly approaching, so I finally used my free four star ticket. Say hello to Gorgon, ladies and gentlemen! Of course, it helps that the Halloween event allows you to get Serpent Jewels really freaking easy and all that, but still! I can roll for Nitocris later, I suppose. That banner's gonna be around for awhile. And now, before anyone asks, I don't want the Extra version of Vlad. Never really liked him. Gorgon's already at her first ascension now~!**

***EDIT*EDIT***

**As of this edit I just got spooked by Cleopatra using my free summon ticket. No rainbow sparks or anything, just a gold assassin card, and right when I figured it was simply another Stheno...so came the spook! Why do I keep getting Servants that I don't expect?! ****I wasn't even trying to roll for her on that banner, I was going for Nitocris, so ****used it right after midnight on a whim! GACHA BANZAI! BANZAI~! I don't know what I did to deserve this kind of luck, but I'm so happy! Why do I keep getting Five Stars from this banner?! Eh!? Oi!**

**Anyhow, I'm off to work again, so I apologize for that.**

**So I'm sorry if this introduction is short.**

**Fourth wall breaks ahoy~!**

**Hope ya enjoy~!**

_"It begins with one, and ends with one._

_There's a certain irony in that, don't you agree?_

_Then, when all's said and done, this will end...with me."_

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Glimpse**

_Well, well, well._

_Looks like the old worm has been laid to rest, eh?_

_Rather__ handily at that. Seems my warning did him little good._

_That's not surprising.; i__n all my calculations, in every outcome Matou Zouken has only ever succeeded once. One time. Thousands of battles, and only a single victory to show for it, in a lone rotten world. Hmm. I may have to go and "trim" that universe, actually. I despite any scenario where Zouken seizes the Holy Grail for himself. It always ends badly, but in a world where he actually wins...no. We can't have that. There can't be a clear cut winner yet; not before everyone meets._

_Still, I didn't expect Jester to take that failed girl under his wing. _

_I almost thought he'd kill her; put her out of her misery. __Not that I'm dissapointed, mind you. It just goes to show that even now, I'm still not omniscient. Life-they!-can still surprise me. Jester was always an anomaly, a miscalculation on my part. In that world, I didn't have to interfere at all. He was born, lived, died, and went to the Throne of Heroes entirely of his own doing. All because of this "Sans" creature. Who was he? Where did he come from? I don't know. Not even Jester does, not really. Is it possible for entities from other worlds to cross over with our own? If so, that would be...fascinating._

_My vision may extend to worlds I'm aware of, but beyond that, nothing._

_Still! This is wonderful! It means my experiment was a success!_

_I haven't been this pleased since the Big Three._

_Berserker._

_Assassin._

_Caster._

_The Original Trio, the ones who started it all. Their journeys are nearly over now._

_As for the others...well._

_I can see the rest of my brothers-and the odd sister here and there-branching out now. All but two have been summoned. Some are fighting for a Holy Grail of their own, in wars great and small. Others have started wars of their own. Some seek to protect. Others to avenge. Some cling to their realms, or their faltering beliefs. Others remain hell-bent on destruction. Some refused to fight. Some refused to hurt. Some had to be culled, for the greater good. __Some had to be pushed into it. Like King and Drifter. All it took was a little...nudge on the forces of the world, a few bad dreams here and there, and they unwittingly did my bidding._

_Speaking of bidding, I may have to pay Beast a...visit._

_He's become a tad too aggressive, you see; we c__an't let him upset the balance just yet._

_It would be such a SHAME if something were to happen to those poor unfortunate souls, don't you think?_

_Beast. Bah. Even his given title is a farce. He's no true Beast, though he thinks himself such. The True Beast would shatter his very soul. What a shame. I didn't even have to goad that false creature into doing what he did. It truly was just a horrible misunderstanding. That one had so much...potential, instead he squanders it hunting down his other selves. More often than not he loses, too. Bites off more than he can chew. An adequate distraction perhaps while I arrange the pieces on the board, but he may have outlived his usefulness._

_None of them are aware of me, none of them know I exist._

_Well. Its high time I changed that, don't you think?_

_And wouldn't you know it? I know just where to start. With a shield. I don't know why, but that purity of his...irks me, somehow. Perhaps he reminds me of what I once was, what I used to be. Before I became this. That one's just as bad as Saver, but at least Saver went and got himself laid. Shielder...pure bastard that he is, reminds me of glass. Like Temptress. Clever of Beast, to cut her out of him. But he made a mistake. In removing the "good" in him, he created something different. Something...new. One good hard smack in the ideals and she might break. Or she might grow as a person and reforge herself into a being truly worthy of pursuing. Who knows? _

_The potential there...excites me, but no. Shielder first._

_A man must show restraint, after all._

_Oh, dear. My family's calling me._

_Is it time for dinner already?_

_I'll see you soon._

**A/N: Clarification!**

**You may like the True Threat.**

**Or you may hate his guts. Time will tell, I suppose.**

**Its strongly hinted that he has a family of his own, as well.**

**I wouldn't put the True Threat at Solomon level strength-no clairvoyance for him!-but he is wickedly strong. He's strong enough to give a Grand Servant a run for their money. ****As to why he's doing all this, well. That'll be revealed in time. I wouldn't call him chaotic evil, but neither good he be considered lawful good either. He simpy...is. He isn't the Prime Naruto-you'll see who that is-but he's not above finding that one and ending him if he steps out of line.**

**Reviews are love, Reviews are life, Reviews keep me alive.**

**So In the Immortal Words of Atlas...Review Would You Kindly? Every word helps. Even a single word like "nice" means the world to me.**

**...**

**...**

**...**

**Fine, just one preview.**

**For the PRIME Naruto, strongest of the bunch.**

**Fair warning, I'm trying a different style here for this preview...**

**(Preview)**

_Hello, there._

_Now, now, don't touch that dial~!_

_You'll be back to your regularly scheduled program in just minute; a__ll I ask is for a moment of your time. __You see, I've brought you here for a reason; because I wanted to have a have a chat with you. You've been following this series for quite some time, haven't you? Forgive me if I've made a mistake. If you're new to this, or simply lost your way, then by all means come in. Sit down by the fire, warm your feet. Let me get you something to drink. No doubt you have questions. __I'm sure you're wondering where all this started. Well, then._

_Suppose its about time you heard MY story._

_So by all means, sit. Listen._

_Its quite the tale..._

**~Nz.**


	15. A Most Unlikely Anomaly

**A/N: Just a fragment, don't mind me...**

** *EDIT***

**BE WARNED!**

**FGO is crashing a lot of phones atm; something to to with the Halloween Revival quest where you're forced to use "Western Servants Only" or somesuch. Its happening to all of us. So don't feel bad. I'm sure they'll get right on it and fix that soon. **

**Now that we've gotten that out of the way, where were we?**

** Everyone's been asking if I'm going to do a Carnival Phantasm with the Unlikely Series. The answer is yes. For any of you familiar with what Fate's Carnival Phantasm is, well, its basically a mad and zany bunch of laughs/shenanigans involving the caste of Fate Stay Night and such. **

**That'll happen here eventually-more of the True Threat's meddling at work-but not quiiiiiiiite yet. ****A Most Unlikely Carnival Phantasm will be coming down the pipeline eventually...**

**Hmm? When, you ask?**

**Well. That would be telling.**

**Anyhow, I'm off to work yet again, so I apologize for that.**

**So I'm sorry if this introduction is short.**

**Fourth wall breaks ahoy~!**

**Hope ya enjoy~!**

_"You will address me proper. Properly."_

_...No. I don't think I'll be doing that anytime soon."_

_"How rude! To think I'd have a knave of a Master like you!"_

_ ...I didn't summon you for your fashion sense or your drama, your majesty."_

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Anomaly**

Cleopatra opened her eyes.

Which was rather baffling, given that she didn't remember answering this summons in the first place. As the light faded, she forced herself to squint up at the faded walls of the warehouse-at least she assumed it to be such-and struggled to find an answer. She was alone. Of that much she was certain. She sensed no Servant, no mage, no...anything. No, it was almost as if someone had dragged her right out of the throne. She hadn't wanted to answer the call of any mere magician, much less one so beneath her stations. She'd been actively refusing any such summons for a reason, after all.

Yet someone had forced her to respond, rather, she hadn't been able to ignore this one.

The tiniest glimmer of curiosity, and then she was hauled through.

Dragged kicking and screaming to the other side.

"Hello?"

Her voice, that sole, solitary word echoed endlessly against the empty. No one answered her. A muscle jumped in her jaw as she turned to face the nearest window. How rude of them. She was certain someone must be here; she could clearly see the summoning circle by the dim light of the crescent moon. So where...?

And so, when the shadows shifted

"You know," a rough voice intoned behind her, "I've been waiting a long time to meet a Servant. Can't say I'm impressed."

Instinct shrieked a warning and she spun.

And she saw.

Clad in a battered and tattered orange-and-black jacket with matching trousers, the young man looked as though he'd stepped right off the battlefield. Though he bore no wounds is body was covered dirt, and upon closer inspection, he appeared to be missing an arm. No, he _was _missing an arm. She could see the awkward bandages ending just below the elbow of his left arm. Something about the blank look in his eyes filled her with dread and yet her mind instantly revolted at his appalling fashion sense.

...nope."

Her first thought was cut the contract, but a Command Spell caught her in midstep, sending her tumbling to the floor.

A pair of cold blue eyes blazed back down at her and despite herself, she flinched away.

By contrast her Master's smile was entirely too fierce for her liking.

"Welcome to the war, your majesty."

She'd learn to _loathe_ that term.

**A/N: Clarification!**

**Its heavily implied that this is a Naruto from an Alternate Universe.**

**Of course I won't be saying who, that'd be telling. So I'll leave it to you to guess.**

**Cleopatra's fine and dandy, don't you worry; this is simply a story that never quite made it to fruition.**

**Now that we've gotten past that, I'd love to hear what you think. Reviews are love, Reviews are life, Reviews keep me alive.**

**So In the Immortal Words of Atlas...Review Would You Kindly? Every word helps. Even a single word like "nice" means the world to me.**

**Fine, just one preview.**

**For the oncoming Carnival Phantasm.**

**(Preview)**

_Don't you have any motivation?! Get going already, you louse!"_

_...guess you could say I don't have the spine for it?"_

_"One more pun and I'll be done!"_

* * *

_You know, its almost funny._

_There's so many of us now. One might even say too many._

_What would happen if they all met?_

_Lets find out, shall we?_

* * *

_"How in the hell did we all wind up here, anyway?"_

_Berserker sighed as he gazed down at the crowd below the lot of them._

_"Alright, time for a head count! How many of us are here?!"_

_Mordred sighed. "Too many to count, zombie."_

_"Right, too many to count-THAT'S NOT A NUMBER!_

**~Nz.**


	16. A Most Unlikely Idol

**A/N: Sorry for any grammar problems, I'm a bit sleep deprived at the moment.**

**Just another fragment that the the trolls killed, don't mind me...**

**I don't have as much time to write as I'd like to these days, I'm absurdly busy with work and life at the moment. So bloody busy. So much so, that I'm barely making my deadlines-and ain't that just peachy?-nor am I sleeping well, at that. Of course, that doesn't stop the ideas from ricocheting around in my head; if I leave them alone too long I'm certain I'll go crazy.**

**So here, have another idea that didn't quite make it to fruition.**

**Love her or hate her, this Servant certainly is...**

**...unique.**

***shrugs helplessly***

**Anyhow, I'm off to work yet again, so I apologize for that.**

**So I'm sorry if this introduction is short.**

**Fourth wall breaks ahoy~!**

**Sorry if its short.**

**Its heavily implied that she's from Not My Chaldea.**

**Hope ya enjoy~!**

_...I want another Servant."_

_"What?! Why?! What did I do?! I'll be good, I promise! Don't send me baaaaaaaaaaack!"_

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Idol**

Elizabeth Bathory considered herself an idol.

Yes, she might be a little tone deaf-poor thing-and might be deliberately ignoring a horrid part of her past, but she still thought of herself as an idol nevertheless. Unlike some, she was perfectly willing to answer when she was summoned forth from the throne, if only because it gave her an opportunity to step out and see the world again. After the disaster with the Little Squirrel-Hakuno!-she wanted nothing more than to do as she pleased, consequences be damned. Such was her twisted mindset. One could even compare the teenage Servant's delusion to Madness Enhancement of a sort.

Sure, the Little Squirrel had locked her up, but at last she hadn't been as bad as that horned bastard.

Just thinking of that whiskered, face and that mad grin made her shiver!

For all intensive purposes, he was the devil!

As such, she thought nothing of answering this summoning as a Lancer in this incarnation.

All that changed when someone promptly pinched her cheek and made her yelp.

Sure enough, she found a familiar pair of blue eyes gazing back at her.

...I want another Servant."

The poor Lancer positively flailed.

_"What?! Why?! What did I do?! I'll be good, I promise! Don't send me baaaaaaaaaaack!"_

**A/N: Clarification!**

**Its heavily implied that this is a Naruto from an Alternate Universe.**

**Of course I won't be saying who, that'd be telling. So I'll leave it to you to guess.**

**Cleopatra's fine and dandy, don't you worry; this is simply a story that never quite made it to fruition.**

**Now that we've gotten past that, I'd love to hear what you think. Reviews are love, Reviews are life, Reviews keep me alive.**

**So In the Immortal Words of Atlas...Review Would You Kindly? Every word helps. Even a single word like "nice" means the world to me.**

**Fine, just one preview.**

**Wonder what would happen if Naruto summoned himself?**

**Or another version of himself, I suppose. Hmm. It bears thinking.**

**(Preview)**

_"You're me?!"_

_"No, I'm not you!"_

_"But you look like me."_

_...this is going to be awkward."_

_"Yeah, just a little bit, seeing as you're a girl..._

**~Nz.**


	17. A Most Unlikely Snow

**A/N: *EDIT* This is a different Naruto, one we haven't seen yet, and may never see.**

**Think of him as an Alternate!Berserker summoned in Fate Stay Night.**

**Let me know if you want this to be a thing.**

**This was...well.**

**I wrote this for a reason.**

**To honor a fallen relative who passed.**

**This was the only way I could think to do it.**

**So...here. I'm sorry, but I need to be alone right now...**

**I'll try to update something tomorrow. Maybe. I just don't know...**

_"We'll meet again someday."_

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Snow**

Naruto laid the flowers on Illya's grave.

It was a simple action, yet his hand still trembled traitorously in the doing, fingers threatening to drop the drying bouquet prematurely lest his legs finally fail and buckle beneath him. Grimacing against the cold as much as his injuries, the whiskered warrior willed himself to straighten and wipe a thick layer of snow from his master's tombstone. The snow continued to fall around him in the faint morning light, yet he nevertheless tended to this task with quiet dispatch, boots crunching against the drifts as he worked to clear the way. Warm breath fogged through the air while he worked, and when he was done, he found he could stand no longer.

He collapsed before her grave, falling humbly to his knees with a long-suffering sigh.

"So, that's it, huh?" a rusty chuckle escaped him. "I'm finally at my limit?"

Only silent snow answered him, much to his chagrin.

...I don't suppose you can hear me, huh."

Was it weakness on his part?

Or was it sorrow?

Who knew?

He still hadn't recovered from the final battle, and now he suspected that he never would. There was no mana left from him to receive; even if there was, he was dying a slow death from heartbreak. There was no one left to mourn with him; either the survivors had gone their separate ways, or they simply couldn't bear to be here. Who could blame him? He'd done terrible things. Horrible things. Of course he had. He hadn't been in his right mind until the end; even then he'd still carried through with her wishes. Damnit. Damn Sakura. Damn her. Shirou would never forgive him. Just as well, that. He didn't want to be forgiven.

They'd won.

So why?

Why?

It had seemed so unlikely from the beginning. At first, he'd scoffed at the idea of fighting in a war, only later embracing it when she'd begged for his help. At the time, it hadn't made any sense. He couldn't be compressed into a Servant container, and yet through some manner of madness, he was. So he fought for her. Bled for her. And at the end, he'd made a horrible choice. He killed a young girl to prevent her from becoming a monster, killed her over and over again until she no longer could revive. He'd stained his fists red with her blood. What did it matter? Illya still died in the end. She was good and kind, and that MAN killed her anyway.

He couldn't save her.

_"Mongrel. Know the price for your insolence!"_

Gilgamesh's caustic laughter still resounded in the back of his mind.

It was too late now; he couldn't find him, no longer had the strength to even fight him.

The last of his energy had been spent just to bring his battered body here, to his final resting place.

"Jeez, this really isn't fair, you know?" the words tumbled out of him in a rush, and another fit of failed laughter seized him as he reached up to the clouds. "I don't want to go."

He had no say in the matter, of course.

Without a physical body, he was destined to return to the throne.

Frankly, it was something of a miracle that he'd managed to last this long at all.

Was that why this victory felt so hollow? Because he wasn't the last Servant standing. All the others had fallen, save them. And yet at the end, the King of Heroes still walked the earth. It just wasn't fair. Although the Holy Grail War had ended, though the grail itself had been shattered, he still remained. Servants would no longer be summoned to this mortal coil...for now. Until someone picked up the pieces and reforge that horrid thing into something even more ghastly. Someone would. Horrible men did horrible things all the time. Some were even worse than Zouken.

Damnit.

He wanted a second chance.

Another opportunity to fix all this.

Naruto bit back a sigh and stole one last furtive glimpse into the clouds as the sun broke through. Perhaps that was naive in him. In this world, it was kill or be killed. Heroes didn't always win the day. Sometimes the good guys lost. Worse, was dying with the knowledge that he'd failed. It left a bitter taste in his mouth. At most, he'd bought this world time. Who knew how long that would be? With no one to stop him, Gilgamesh might well burn the earth. The mages of this era would have to fend for themselves. This world no longer had heroes. If only there was another way. A chance to go back. Reset. Fix it all. Even as his mind scrabbled for a solution, he knew it was too late.

But maybe, if there was another world, another throne, another chance, maybe this wouldn't be in vain.

A growl built in his throat, and he tried to stand, only to topple backward as his body finally betrayed him at long last.

Independent Action had held him in this world for long enough, but no longer. Already he could feel himself beginning to flicker. Particles of blue light welled up from his skin, peeling away out of his battered jacket as all that remained of his body came apart at the seams. His arm, still stretched toward the sun, reaching, grasping, now crumbled away into dust. He laughed at it. Laughed, as the rest of him fell apart like a broken puppet, rejected by the earth, deprived of mana, of strength, of will, but not his voice. Never his voice. He wouldn't die with tears in his eyes.

Still laughing, Naruto sagged and bowed his head low, stubbornly clinging on in his last moments.

"Well. I'm going to Ichiraku." He chortled softly. "You want anything...Illya?"

For a moment, just a moment, he thought he heard a reply.

Surely he was imagining things. Wasn't he?

_He faded soon thereafter._

**A/N: No long author's note this time. **

**Just a memento of sorts for someone that's no longer...here.**

**Reviews are love, Reviews are life, Reviews still keep me alive.**

**So In the Immortal Words of Atlas...Review Would You Kindly? Every word helps. Even a single word like "nice" means the world to me.**

**So here. Have a preview of...something.**

**(Preview)**

_"You've served your purpose, monster. Now be reunited with your family."_

_Beast gurgled wordlessly up at him._

_"Yes, that's it. Just fall asleep..._

**~Nz.**


	18. Author's Note: Issues

**A/N: ...hey.**

**So. I have good news and bad news.**

**Good news is that today, I somehow rolled Nitocris, Rama, and Gilles (Caster) by blind bloody luck.**

**Bad news...I've just about lost my job. My bloody bosses blindsided me with the news this evening. I stuck with that blasted bloody company for YEARS through thick and thin despite everything, through a failed promotion, and this is how they repay me? I begged, I cried, and I pleaded, all for naught. I was one of their top earners too, nice to everyone, I did my job well, and they just TURNED ON ME FOR NO REASON-no, no, calm down, Neon.**

**Caaaaaaaalm.**

**In short? I told them I wasn't putting up with their shit and went home.**

**Coupled with all the crap I've been going through, and the sheer amount of spam-hate A Most Unlikely Lancer got-I've since deleted those-I think I'm going to take tonight off. On the plus side, you can expect a better update tomorrow for an actual story.**

**I'm deeply sorry for this.**

**~Nz.**


	19. A Most Unlikely Vampire

**A/N: Just a quick fragment I wanted to try out, still not feeling better yet.**

**Why, ****I think I've discovered a new emotion. Something between Sorrow and Hatred.**

**Remember the incident I mentioned the other day? Its basically seeping into my thoughts like a poison.**

**I'm a bit of a hysteric mess at the moment, so please forgive any grammar issues. My job is just being plain spiteful to me now, considering the fact that they tried to screw me; to which I up and left for the day.**

**Amazingly, I still have said job, and they "forgave" me for walking out.**

**It certainly doesn't help that even if I get past this, they've all but devastated my mindset towards them. I felt safe there. Comfortable even. Now I feel like, even if we sort this out, it's going to feel as if I have a scythe hanging over my head, ready to drop at the slightest provocation. Who's to say they won't find some other way to get rid of me? Who's to say that all of my time there wasn't just one big waste? All that stress literally gave me a heart attack. Nevermind the fact that I may or may not be _DYING!_ Ha. Haha. Hahaha! Its a wonder I haven't gone bonkers!**

**0_0**

**This is also a hint of things to come, considering tomorrow's update.**

**Because folks were asking about Chaldea.**

**Now, then. Without further adieu!**

**Here. We. Go.**

**Thoughts?**

_"No man can defeat me."_

_"Ah, but what then is a man-_

_"Don't say it. DON'T YOU DARE."_

**~?**

**A Most Unlikely Vampire**

Vlad opened his eyes.

It came as something of a surprise that he would be summoned again at all; it felt like mere moments had passed since his defeat. Yet when the call came he answered it readily all the same. A tiny voice the begged and pleaded for aid in the fight to save humanity, and unthinkingly he had answered. How unlike him. Yet he could feel that something was different. This time, the king knew had not manifested in the Lancer class. He could feel the difference in his Saint Graph from the moment he manifested, just as he too experienced an annoying burn in the back off his throat. No, he was not a Lancer.

Nay, for he had unintentionally been summoned as a Berserker himself. Oh, the irony.

It was enough to make a man mad.

And so he laughed.

Even now, as the light faded, he felt a familiar phantom pain in his chest where his heart should have been. _Where his heart had been torn out by that brutal Berserker._ When he looked down his chest remained hale and whole, yet the pain persisted; an old memory carved upon his soul. Perhaps that lingering pain would follow him for the rest of his days. Just the thought of it was enough to elicit a sigh. If this was the price he was to pay for his foolishness then so be it. He would bear this burden and hold no grudges for his defeat.

It had been a worthy duel and he'd died as a man, not a monster.

The defeat was wholly his; now he hoped for a chance to redeem himself, and perhaps fight alongside him. If this was Chaldea, as the Throne informed him, then perhaps he would have his chance. Surely he was not the only Servant here. He could certainly sense...something in the distance, muddled by the walls of the chamber. A large, teeming mass of energy slowly making its way towards him. Another Servant perhaps? Several? He couldn't be sure, but it almost felt like...ah, but he digressed. The girl before him-such bright, flaming hair-was gazing back at with awe and wonder, awaiting his response.

He'd repay her courtesy.

"Servant, Berserker." he intoned regally, inclining his head. "I have answered your summons. My true name is Vlad Tepes." a pause followed. "Tell me, is that man here?"

Much to his bemusement, the girl actually unbent enough to sketch a hasty bow before tilting her head at him. "I don't understand. What man?"

"My apologies." Vlad said. "You would know him as...Naruto, I believe his name was. His class was Berserker, much like mine own."

"Well, there's two of them." Fujimaru explained with a long-suffering sigh. "Avenger came first. Pride came...after."

"Pride?" He arched an eyebrow in mild consternation at her turn-of-phrase. "I know of no such class."

"We're pretty sure he's a _Berserker_, but he won't let us call him anything else."

Sure enough, a loud crash answered her as the doors rushed open.

And he found himself faced with the impossible.

...why are there two of you?"

**A/N: Aaaaaand there we go. Sorry this isn't an update for one of my other stories, I'm...just dealing with a lot of crap.**

**Also, that sad little bastard calling me a review whore can fuck right off.**

**Reviews are love. Reviews are life. Reviews make me strive.**

**What's wrong with enjoying those, I ask you?!**

**So in the Immortal Words of Atlas...**

**...Review Would You Kindly?**

**Here, have a preview.**

**(Previews!)**

_"Listen here, muscles. Don't go picking fights with Heracles! Its not allowed!"_

_Pride scoffed._

_"Who decided that?"_

* * *

_Jiraiya looked left._

_Jiraiya looked right, then..._

_"Ladies, I can explain. This is a misunderstanding."_

_"Oh?" Altera tilted her head._

_Nero was only a heartbeat behind._

_Artoria's reaction proved more profound. "EXCALIBUR..._

_"Nononononowaitjustasecond!"_

**_...MORGAN!"_**

_Chaldea shook with the sheer force of the explosion that followed._

**R&R~! ****=D**


	20. A Most Unlikely Surprise

**A/N: And the daily updates continue!**

**I've updated this one continuously for the last few days in addition to others, in case anyone's wondering.**

**Sorry.**

**I know I keep updating this, and that they don't feel like real updates. I've just...got a lot on my plate atm. I want Berserker to be bloody flawless and given the chaos circling my life, I'm not able to crank out the big ones as much as I'd like to. Toss in job hunting and its a right and proper bitch.**

**Babylonia is currently kicking my ass.**

**Still, my luck seems to be holding in other aspects at least. Ibaraki spooked the hell out of me earlier today.**

**Now then, on we go.**

**A Most Unlikely Shielder should be update tomorrow, my health and sanity willing.**

**I'd say "this" Naruto is more meme-worthy than his brothers, if only because he's a lazy bastard. Hell, even the title is a pun.**

**Still, it gives us a peak into the inner-workings of Chaldea, so there's that.**

_"Save the world? Me Nah, sounds like too much work. Ibaraki and Shuten can do that. G'night."_

_"Bullshit! Nobody's that lazy! Even you can't possibly be-_

_"Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz..._

_"He fell asleep?!"_

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Surprise**

_"WHO DARES SUMMON ME?!"_

Under normal circumstances, Ereshkigal wouldn't have shouted thus upon her arrival to Chaldea; indeed, it was not in the goddess's nature to shout at all unless provoked. In her mind, a true goddess must be prim and proper at all times, and as such, she had her image to maintain. Yes. Certainly. Ordinarily that would've been the case. She wouldn't have announced herself in such a fashion. But after the sheer unmitigated disaster of her last contract - and the less said about that one the better-she wanted nothing more than to get out of the Throne as soon as she went back to it. As it stood, she'd set something of a record.

Shortest summoning ever.

Honestly! Her Master had taken one look at her and cut their contract on the spot!

What kind of brute did such a thing?! What manner of monster would be so cruel?! She didn't deserve to be bullied like this!

Thus when the call came down from Chaldea, she'd been all too happy to answer it. She didn't care if humanity needed her; frankly, she just wanted to be needed by _someone_ at all. Her pride was in tatters already; she'd even gone so far as to possess another body similar to her last one just to manifest at all. That...may have affected her mindset a bit, but even so! She was determined not to be thrown away this time. Ishtar wouldn't let her live that _first _failure down before; she'd never hear the end of it if there was a second!

And if that meant she had to make a bit of a ruckus-and inspire a touch of fear-then so be it!

But nobody came.

Indeed, the blond goddess found herself alone in the summoning chamber altogether; instead of the warm welcome or the Master she'd expected, she found only four looming walls and a terribly scorched ceiling awaiting her baffled gaze. Whoops. Perhaps she should have held back a bit? But still! Where was everyone?! She knew this was Chaldea. Indeed, it must be. The Throne had blazed that information in the back of her mind like an angry red ember. So where, where, WHERE was everyone?!

"Mwah?!" a soft, bored yawn greeted her. "I wasn't sleeping! Definitely not sleeping! Did someone actually show up this time?!"

Aghast, the goddess looked down.

Sprawled out near the doors leading to the summoning chamber-no wonder she hadn't seen her!-a young girl clad in a yellow kimono was only just now beginning to stir. A half-eaten chocolate bar lay stuck to her cheek, suggesting she'd fallen asleep on it somehow, but that soon proved to be the least of her concerns. Said girl took one look at her and thrashed upright with an indignant sputter. During said thrashing, Ereshkigal glimpsed a pair of horns jutting out of her forehead amidst her golden hair. She, whomever she was, wasn't human.

Words clamored in Eresh's head as she flailed her arms, to no avail. "I...but you...where...?!"

"Nah, I'm no Master," the girl waved flippantly in answer to her unspoken question. "I'm just just Ibaraki. We went and set the summoning system to automatic. Damn thing uses saint quartz randomly once a day. Didn't expect someone to actually answer at this hour."

Oh.

Well, then.

That was disheartening.

Still, it left the matter of this...creature.

A small, scornful smile twitched at her lips. "And just who are you, brat?"

Of course she rose to the bait; the girl gave a low growl and swatted her hand away.

"HEY! Watch your tongue, missy! I'm not a brat! I'm an Oni! There's a difference, idiot! My Boss told me to stand guard here and guard the gate!" The little oni informed her, puffing her diminutive chest out proudly as she presented her given task. "He wanted me to keep watch for thots so they don't disturb him!"

A pause pushed itself between them.

"Wait." At last, Ibaraki wrinkled her nose. "Although, come to think of it...are you a thot?"

Eresh _felt _her jaw come unhinged as she gaped down at this unassuming girl.

And then the words caught up with her all at once. _"Why you little...?!"_

"Oh for the love of...!" a new voice rumbled, "What's all this?!"

All at once, the doors behind them rushed up with a hiss of steam to reveal the one who'd raised their voice. Whatever threat Ereshkigal might made withered away on her lips as she beheld the newcomer; if only because he looked so damndedly familiar. Bright blue eyes squinted at her beneath blond bangs, his whiskered cheeks pinching in a mild scowl as lazily he scratched the center pf his forehead. One had but to glimpse the twin blue horns jutting out there to realize that this man wasn't wholly human either, for better or worse. He looked like he'd crawled out of bed, indeed, he wore little more than black slacks and a tattered orange shirt that looked to have seen better days indeed.

With a jaw popping yaw, the young master scratched his horns anew gave her a searching look.

"Really? You arrived now? Its half past midnight. I was sleeping, ya know."

Ibaraki saw the opportunity and pounced. "Boss! I found a thot!"

Her head snapped toward the Oni. "I WILL END YOUR LIFE!"

Such was Ereshkigal's first evening in Chaldea.

_She did not fare well._

**A/N: Hope this made you smile; that was the intention. At this point, they haven't even tackled the First Singularity.**

** I'll leave it to you guys and gals to decide if this should become a bonafide story or not.**

** Because HER banner is coming soon, so I figured, why the hell not?**

**And also that Ibaraki bit at the end, because she spooked me.**

**Chaldea!Naruto is one we'll see later.**

**He's a Master...and yet not.**

**Its heavily implied that...**

**...well. He's a lazy guy.**

**Warm regards,**

**(Previews?)**

_"YOU!"_

_"Do I look familiar? I get that a lot."_

_He patted her head, laughing. "Welcome to Chaldea. You want a tour?_

_"You're the fifth Servant to answer the call. Shuten and Ibaraki were the first. We don't talk about the third; because we sent Medb right back. And as for the fourth..._

_"Ah! There you are, boy! And who might be this be?!"_

_A loud cackle boomed down the hall._

_...that would be Iskandar."_

* * *

_"Save the world? At this hour? Me Nah, sounds like too much work. Ibaraki and Shuten can do that. G'night."_

_Eresh sputtered. "Bullshit! Nobody's that lazy! Even you can't possibly be-_

"Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...

_"He fell asleep?!"_

**~Nz.**


	21. A Most Unlikely Mage

**A/N: So.**

**I'm still alive.**

**Now, then. *****inhales deeply***

**NEON DAI SHORI! ****I just got spooked by Raikou, I kid you not.**

**...and now Shuten.**

**Wasn't even rolling for either on that new banner. I just wanted Danzo T_T**

**There, now that we've gotten that taken care of, back to the story. Because an old friend asked for this and another fic. ****Just a little something to prove I'm not dead yet. ****Been awhile, hasn't it? ****This is just a little something to prove I'm not dead. ****Can't do much else at the moment given the state of my health, sorry. ****But the trolls were quite happy to pounce while I was away for the last few days, so consider this a response of sorts.**

***shrugs helplessly***

**Well, I've finally finished all the content in Grand Order for the time being. Shinjuku and Agartha were hell towards the end-looking at you, Megalos!-but I enjoyed 'em. Shimosa was INSANE and I somehow got Musashi in all the chaos, not to mention I got sodding spooked by Tomoe. I also recently got Parvati and Heracles as well as Emiya and Tristan. So...I guess I'm going to sit tight and look forward to the rest, now that I've used up all my free quartz. Hard to believe I blew through the game in less than a year. 0_0**

**Now I've just gotta wait for the Lostbelts...**

**So here we are, the second-to-last entry in this series before the Mastermind rears his ugly head.**

**A Most Unlikely Mage; a****t least, that's what the world considers him to be.**

**Unlike his brethren, he's an actual spell-slinger that could qualify for the Caster role if he so chose. He's one of the few that fall into the "Unknown" category at that.**

**Also, fair warning of sorts.**

**This Naruto is almost fiendishly clever.**

**He could even be considered evil in a certain light.**

**Why? He the sort to do something just because he could.**

**Not out of malice or any sort of cruelty, but rather...simple curiosity.**

**His appearance rather resembles...well. I'm sure most of you are familiar with **_Arifureta_** by now~!**

**One final note; as of this chapter, I AM working on non Fate related stories. Don't worry, I haven't forgotten them.**

_"I believe in the power of belief. For that is what defines us."_

_...that sentence doesn't make a lick of sense, idiot."_

_"On the contrary. It explains everything."_

_~?_

**A Most Unlikely Mage**

_Amazing._

_Fascinating, fascinating, **FASCINATING!**_

_Life is absolutely marvelous, wouldn't you agree?_

_Throughout time and space, there's so much to do, so much to see...and be. Countless mystics miracles since the dawn of earth, and from the time I was small, I wanted to see them all. Understand them all. What is a Tailed Beast? Some manner of phantasmal? Or something more? What is magic for that matter? Are they related? Parallel to one another? The same? One could argue that magic circuits and chakra coils stem from the same branch of knowledge, but I would argue otherwise. To this day, I haven't solved this mystery. At a glance it resembles chakra, yet in that same vein its so much...more. Magic can do what chakra cannot._

_Can't it?_

_As for me...my change stemmed from a simple insult, really._

_A tiny ripple in an otherwise placid pond, one with far-reaching consequences._

_Looking back, one might not think a single stray word would have such far-reaching consequences. But it did._

_Everyone called me an idiot. I can't even remember their faces anymore, or their names. But I'll never forget the sound of their voices. Those low, angry growls. The pain of broken bones. I first felt that pain when I was kicked out of the orphanage. Then again, when I flunked out of the academy for the first time. And the second. Third. Fourth. Fifth. And they were right. In the beginning, I was naught but a blond buffoon with nothing but a loud voice and a sullen demon to my name. Pranks availed me nothing. Questions gained me nothing. Shouting gained me nothing. No, it became abundantly clear that no one was going to teach me anything._

_So I taught myself._

_I snuck into the library whenever I could; stole scrolls when I couldn't. My mind was made up; if no one would help me, then why should I concern myself with helping them? More often than not I was caught, but that didn't discourage me. If anything, it only emboldened my efforts. When I finally worked up the nerve to steal the infamous Scroll of Sealing myself...it was wholly of my own volition. There was no Mizuki to prod me into action_

_I poured over arcane texts wherever I could find them, and in doing so, reached an understanding that would turn even the sternest sage green with envy._

_It was then, at the lowest point in my life, that someone approached me._

_He called himself Solomon._

_**King of Mages.**_

_He offered me a golden chalice, something he called the Holy Grail, and asked me what I would be willing to trade for such knowledge. Wisdom and strength such as I'd never known. Perhaps, had I known the truth of what he was back then, what he had planned for the world...no. It wouldn't have changed my answer. The answer was obvious. I couldn't give him my legs. I needed those. But what I didn't need...in exchange for nigh-unlimited power?_

_Compared to that, what's the price of my left arm?_

_Or your my right eye?_

_I gave him both._

_I'll never forgive his laugh, or the words that followed._

_"Yes, that's what I was expecting."_

_I traded both not for power, but for knowledge; to see into the unseen, to know the unknown. In time, I built myself a better arm of peerless steel and crafted an eye that could see death itself. I consider myself a scholar, first and foremost. So I've slaughtered a few hundred-thousands!-in my day. They were bad people. They had to go. I offer no justifications for my deeds. Hero? Villain? I scoff at those gaudy titles. Let history label me as they will._

_Humanity can burn for all I care._

_Naruto was an idiotic boy._

_I buried him._

_Magic._

_Saddled with a horrible curse, burdened by this terrible power, yet with that power came curiosity. Not responsibility, but rather, a boundless inquisitiveness that I couldn't possibly hope to fathom. Chakra wasn't enough for me; the power it possessed, while applicable given the right amount, held its own...drawbacks._

_I wasn't just afraid of death; no, I was d__ownright terrified of it._

_One day its all just going to...stop. And I won't know when. So I sought ways to circumvent it. And eventually...I found one._

_I wasn't idle._

_I took that Grail given me by Solomon and I went to town. I summoned nine Servants, one for each tail of the beast trapped within me. With their power, everything fell before us._

_An evil mastermind of an Archer._

_A timid yet clever Caster who feared death._

_An almighty Lancer whose spear burned brighter than the sun._

_A smiling Saber wielding many swords and serving her own erratic creed._

_Next came a mechanical Assassin who swore to serve my will in every aspect of her life._

_Rider...well. I cant claim to have much experience with pirates, much less a madwoman like this one._

_And then we have Berserker. Hmm. The less said about that one the better. Wouldn't want to set them off._

_As if Avenger would allow that. She's called the Dragon Witch for a reason, after all._

_They all swore to serve me_

_Its all one grand experiment, really._

_So cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war._

_If you seek knowledge, then you must take it from me._

_Let them come._

**A/N: Aaand there you have it! **

**Not dead, nearly done with A Most Unlikely Berserker, and still kicking.**

**Next chapter we get right down to the nitty gritty! It'll be out soon, providing my health holds, so look forward to it ya know!**

**So...in the immortal words of Atlas...**

**...Review, Would You Kindly? And of course, enjoy the preview!**

**(Preview)**

_"Are you controlling them?!"_

_"Not at all. Every Servant you see here before you has chosen to serve me of their own accord."_

* * *

_Kiara positively purred._

_"Ohhhhh~? What is this place?"_

_"Any number of things, I suppose." The Mage tilted his head as he reclined upon his throne. "Some might call it a Singularity. Others, a Lostbelt. It doesn't matter to me." slim shoulders rolled beneath the blackened robes he wore. "This is my world, and I don't suffer intruders lightly. I don't suppose you'll tell me how you were summoned...no, it doesn't matter. Now, to quote a wise man..._

_A blazing circle erupted beneath the intruder's feet._

_...get thee gone, thot."_

* * *

_"A pleasure to meet you, Lord El-Melloi."_

_...sarcasm does not become you."_

_"Doesn't it?"_

**R&R! =D**


End file.
